Steve Morison refused to pull any punches as he analysed Norwich City's disappointing performance at Aston Villa.

'Just not good enough,' said the Canaries striker.

Defeat ended a mini-run of three games unbeaten in the top flight for Paul Lambert's team, but Morison refused to concede that a mid-table position after 11 games was acceptable for a club many had tipped for a quick return to the Championship.

'Of course not,' said the Welshman. 'It could always be worse, but it could always be better – no one is ever happy.

'But if you go home happy today then there is something wrong.'

City had made a near-perfect start, dominating the early exchanges and going ahead through a superb Anthony Pilkington free-kick after 25 minutes.

Defensive lapses allowed Villa to respond quickly and build a 3-1 lead before Morison's 77th-minute header set up a nail-biting finish.

But City were unable to repeat the rescue act they had produced against Blackburn seven days earlier when they grabbed a point.

As the players departed Villa Park, the disappointment was clear to see.

The post-match message from Lambert had been short and to the point.

'We need to do better – that was the long and short of it really,' Morison said.

'We could have got something at the end and we didn't – so it's not the best. We did all right, but we didn't do well enough and we need to do better if we are going to win games in the Premier League. In this league it is about picking up points, whether it is one or three. As you can see from last year, Blackpool missed out by one point and we don't want to be going out of this league on one point. Obviously it is vital to pick results up and go on little runs where you are not losing games. That's very important.

'We need to get back to what we were doing. We were doing very very well and we have let ourselves down in the last couple of weeks, conceding too many goals as a team and we need to stop that.

'But I think one thing you take from this is we have got such great heart and we are never beaten and I think Aston Villa will say today that they always thought we were maybe going to get back in it at the end there.'

Morison headed home Grant Holt's cross but took little consolation from his third goal of the season, which set up the late charge.

'I scored today and that is a good thing, but it doesn't really matter too much if we are not winning games,' he said. 'We got the goal and we had a little rally. That happens every week because they get a little apprehensive, they're not winning too many – but we weren't good enough today.

'It was a decent goal in the scheme of things, it got us back in, but it wasn't good enough because we didn't do what we could have done, finish it off. It is nice to score goals, but you want to be doing it when you get points on the board.'

Morison will be heading to Wales today for the friendly against Norway in Cardiff on Saturday, before returning to prepare for City's home game against a resurgent Arsenal.

'We can't worry about them at the minute, we just have to worry about ourselves and worry about that game that has just gone and we have got to work on what we did wrong in the week and get ready for them in a couple of weeks,' he said. 'It is going to be a very, very tough game, and we will see what we can do. I'm going away on Monday to play for Wales against Norway and hopefully I can get out there and score a couple of goals.

'Everyone goes on about your home form, you never want to play at home and lose games so it's given really, but I think in this league we go out to every game and we want to win it. When we don't we are disappointed. We didn't today so we go home not happy.'