Peterborough United boss admits his players didn't turn up early enough for their Carabao Cup tie

Posh bowed out at the first round stage after conceding two goals in the first six minutes at Championship opposition.

They improved greatly after the break, but couldn’t find a goal that would have put the tie back in the balance.

Evans made three changes to this starting line-up, resting his two main strikers Jason Cummings and Matt Godden, while handing full debuts to Callum Cooke, Ivan Toney and Tyler Denton. Left-back Colin Daniel was also rested.

“You can’t go anywhere in the country and concede two goals that early on and expect to win,” Evans lamented. “Never mind doing it against Championship opposition.

“We didn’t turn up in the first half. The shape of the team and the players we changed didn’t work for us. We stood off them too far. You can’t give players of their quality half a yard and yet we were giving them five yards and two individuals didn’t track their runners to give them their goals.

“And once they got ahead we found it hard to stop their momentum. They did to us what we did to Rochdale on Saturday by scoring two goals in quick succession.

“After that our strategy for the rest of the first-half was to keep it a 2-0.

“But the players and the management will learn from this game and we will be ready for Luton on Saturday (August 18). We win together and lose together.

“I was pleased with the second half though. We changed the team and the tactics a bit and we were by far the better side, although they probably sat back a bit.

“We had some moments and we really should have scored twice in the last 10 minutes. If we’d scored the first chance through Siriki Dembele I’m sure we would have gone to penalties.

“We’ll take the pain though and make it work in our favour against Luton.”

Posh host the Hatters in a League One fixture at the ABAX Stadium on Saturday.