Back to basics plea by Stephen Baxter as Carrick are dumped out of the BetMcLean Cup by Armagh City

The Amber Army were the casualty of a cup upset as the Premiership side were beaten by their Championship counterparts at Holm Park.

Things seemed to be going well for Carrick as they took the lead on 11-minutes when Paul Heatley marked his return from a head injury to fire them ahead.

However, Armagh rallied and levelled from the spot soon after through Igor Rutkowski, before scoring twice more in a six-minute spell via Scott McCann and Stephen Teggart to lead 3-1.

Nedas Maciulaitis pulled one back to make it 3-2 at the interval, and despite Armagh having defender Dermot McCaffrey sent-off early in the second-half, they held out for victory.

"It's a very disappointing result," Baxter told Carrick Rangers' social media platforms.

"It's a result that I take full responsibility for because I came here tonight looking to try and get four or five of our senior guys a rest in regards to two games in a week.

"Trying to rest a few legs to make sure we have the fit guys available for your weekend football in the Premiership.

"We've given opportunities to others, which we need to do of course, debuts for one or two and for one or two who hadn't been playing.

"But we didn't get the spark, we started off brightly and Paul scored a wonderful goal.

"I don't think the first was a penalty which lets them back in the game and that signals a scenario where we went into a shell.

"I'm disappointed in how we've shown ourselves here today. We've had a good long chat about it, we're all big grown adults and we need to see improvement.

"I'm very disappointed with how we've finished this game, we've had enough chances to get back in it, they went down to 10 men and they defended for their lives."

It marks five successive defeats for Carrick – sandwiched between the abandoned game at home to Bangor – and Baxter knows they need to return to fundamentals as they take on Portadown at Taylors Avenue this weekend.

He added: “Without wanting to give a lot of tactics away, you’ve got to do the simple basics right.

“We’re not doing that right now and if you look at the goals we’re conceding in the last four or five games, they are all our mistakes.

"Teams put you under that pressure that leads to mistakes but all these things are coming from very simple mistakes.

"The first four games we were pressing in a good style but we’ve not done that particularly well from that.

"That needs to change, we’ve got to do the basics right and we haven’t been doing that in the last two or three games.

"We need to do what Armagh did tonight by putting your head on the ball, foot through the ball at the right time.

"They’re human beings, they are wonderful guys and whilst I’ll be disappointed with them and I’ll tell them so, I’ll love them tomorrow and that’s just how it all works.”