Matt Sherratt accepts Cardiff were outplayed in virtually every area as a rampant Harlequins displayed their class in the Investec Champions Cup.
The Blue and Blacks got off to a perfect start in front of a sell-out 12,000 crowd and raced into 15-7 lead thanks to a Thomas Young brace.
But that was as good as it got for the hosts, who were unable to cope with Harlequins power and speed of play with Marcus Smith and Danny Care expertly pulling the strings.
Sherratt was naturally disappointed with both the performance and defeat but there were no excuses.
He said: “We were beaten in most areas really. I thought we had some energy first 30 minutes and chucked a few punches, scored a nice couple of tries and were right in it.
"You could probably see when they scored just before half-time It knocked a little bit of the confidence and took our legs away. Once your legs start going with people like Care, Smith and Tyrone Green on the field, it's a long evening.
“We’ve been beaten by a better side. Sometimes you just got to sit there and they're a better side.
“You’re playing Toulouse, your Baths, your Harlequins That's it's one level down from a Test match. They’ve got so much firepower that they are going to hurt you so what you can't do is help them with that and there's a couple of times where we exited or after we'd scored we got turned over first race on the kick-off and their into the corner for a try
“We scored again, we got a penalty against us from another exit, bang and it's a try. You can't do that. With Marcus Smith on the field and a lot of the quality they’ve got, they're going to get you.
“You can have a great defence but they can still score. What you can't do is give them points. I felt we did that a little bit tonight, not through any lack of effort, just probably a little bit of naivety at times.
“It’s a different quality of opposition if I'm honest. As we said, 25 minutes in we were competing, the crowd were up and we were in the game. What it showed probably a little bit tonight was at half time, if I'm honest, it was a little bit quiet in the dressing room and we haven't been like that.
“That try right on the final act of the half took the stuffing out of us a little bit. But we've got to learn that that's the game. It was only a 13-point game at half time. We score first, second half, we're back in it.
“It's not sobering. There's some easy things that we can work on, a couple of the exits and things like that.
“But listen, there's no point in looking at isolated incidents in a game like that, let's be honest, throughout the game really and across the pitch, they were the better team tonight. They were well coached, stack full of internationals, internationals coming off the bench, they are a good side and it was a good side at the top of their game.”
When asked about the comparison between budgets, with the salary cap in Wales due to reduce further, Sherratt admits there are no quick fixes but he is confident Cardiff have a plan.
He added: “There's a lot that goes behind that though. There's no magic answer to that. That's done off the field first, not on the field. It's very easy to look at your training week and what can we do to get better.
“Ultimately they're a very well established club. I don't like talking about budget, it sounds like an excuse, but they've grown over time, they've got good staff, good foundations, good academies and that's what you get on the back of something like that.
“So it's not about 8 o'clock kick-off in Cardiff and what we've done in the week, it's about the foundations of the club.
“We're at the start of that and it is the infancy as well so that's going to take some time. On the odd occasion we'll have a great night at the Arms Park and we'll compete on a one-off but they're doing that week in, week out and we're not anywhere near that at the moment.”