GARETH Ainsworth apologised to Wanderers fans who suffered his side’s performance at York City, saying he didn’t recognise some of his players.

Blues were down and out by the time the half time whistle was sounded, having been thoroughly outplayed by a side chasing down a play-off spot.

City were 2-0 up at the break through Ryan Bowman’s early penalty and Josh Carson’s strike, but in truth they were already home and hosed and could arguably have doubled their advantage even before half time came.

Ainsworth was left seething at his players’ efforts, saying it dropped well below standards they and he had set for them.

The killer second goal was a case in point, as Sam Wood’s corner was comfortably cleared by the first man and the Minstermen broke out and scored the goal that effectively ended the match as a contest.

Ainsworth said: “It’s a goal I still can’t believe we conceded, from our own corner. It’s compounded everything and left us with a mountain to climb.

“It’s a sloppy goal to concede, with a counter attack – the number of times they countered on our own corners, I’m very unhappy with that. It was a sloppy, sloppy corner from us. There were some unrecognisable players out there. Hopefully it was a one-off.

“I apologise to the fans who made the journey, because that wasn’t up to standard for me.”

He added: “It’s not good enough. The onslaught we took in the first five minutes of the game finally told with them getting the penalty. Whether it was a penalty or not, they were camped in our half for five minutes. I wasn’t happy with the way we started the game.

“Second half we battled hard and managed to keep it 0-0 but we should have done that first half.

“I had a lot of unrecognisable players today – not the standards I have set and not the standards they have set, and they’ll be disappointed with the performance.

“They won’t be getting off with that one lightly – I’ll be telling people just what I think of where they went wrong.

“First thing is I have to get a DVD to watch and I’m not looking forward to that.”

Blues are three points above the drop zone and Ainsworth said: “We are lucky results have gone for us – no one in the bottom half won except Cheltenham.

“I want to look at this first and see where we went wrong and telling people why and what for.”