Stoke boss Mark Hughes disappointed after second cup exit
Sunday 31 January 2016 10:48, UK
Mark Hughes said Stoke's fourth round FA Cup loss at Crystal Palace was a consequence of their midweek defeat to Liverpool in the Capital One Cup.
The Potters' 1-0 defeat at Selhurst Park came just five days after they lost their Capital One Cup semi-final second leg at Anfield on penalties.
With his side having played 120 minutes during the week, Hughes made eight changes to his team to face Palace but they responded with a flat performance, eventually losing out to Wilfried Zaha's winner.
However, Hughes was disappointed to be knocked out of a second competition in the space of a week and called on his side to challenge for a spot in Europe.
"It's been a hard week to take," he said. "You don't want to go out of two competitions. We wanted to progress and this was a consequence of [Tuesday].
"We were a little bit stretched, we had a number of players unavailable. We didn't have enough in the final third when we had good opportunities.
"We're disappointed because it's a competition we wanted to do well in.
"We can have a good run at the European places [via the Premier League], we're very much in the mix. We can focus on what we have left. We want to try and build on the past two seasons, which is two ninth-placed finishes. We want to go better than that."
