Leyton Orient head coach Ross Embleton was disappointed that his side failed to impose themselves on the game as they crashed out in the first round of the FA Cup as they fell to a 2-1 defeat to league rivals Newport County.
Jamie Devitt’s wonder strike stole the limelight from Hector Kyprianou’s first professional goal and ultimately proved to be the difference between the two sides.
The Newport captain’s 77th-minute strike guaranteed the Exiles a place in the Second Round but Orient’s journey has come to an unfortunate end at the Breyer Group Stadium.
“A good team, got some very good players and I really like what they’re about, what has disappointed me the most is I don’t feel we’ve really imposed ourselves on the game and given ourselves the opportunity to really test ourselves,” Embleton admitted.
“Credit to them, the winning goal was absolutely stunning in terms of the way the boy strikes it into the top corner, albeit it again we gave away an incredible amount of chances.
“We need to do better in terms of moments in the game where we need to try get control of the game.
“We didn’t get good enough balls up to the front.”
The boss was keen to heap praise on 19-year-old midfielder Hector Kyprianou who netted his first professional goal in the match.
“Hopefully people will start understanding when I get excited about this boy because I think that he’s got an incredible temperament. “You can see the physical statue, the athlete that he is, and I thought the goal was fantastic and I’m absolutely delighted for him but there were some moments where you could see what he was really about.
“He does things that other kids of his age won’t be able to do, the way he takes the ball under pressure, and the way he can travel up the pitch with it.
“Some of the things he does is top level stuff so now he’s back and had his time out on the pitch it gives him a real opportunity to kick on.”
Embleton was also keen to reiterate his disappointment of crashing out of the cup especially after two decent cup runs already this season.
“It’s a disappointment to be out of the cup, I think it’s very easy to forget that we’ve already had two good cup runs, let’s not forget we got to the round to play Tottenham whether or not we got to play them we still reached that strong round in that competition.
“Sadly we had that ripped away from us, we’ve progressed in the EFL Trophy, whether anyone gives that competition any credibility you can only progress in it.
“We’ve had two steady cup runs and I’m disappointed we haven’t progressed as I felt we had the opportunity to do that.”
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