Matt Gill admits Norwich City Under-23s need to go back to the drawing board after a heavy loss away to Stoke inflicted a third successive defeat on the young Canaries.

The Potters raced into a four-goal lead before half-time in Leek, before City U23s' top scorer Adam Idah scored a penalty to reduce the arrears in the 51st minute, won by Josh Coley.

The onslaught continued though and the hosts were 7-1 ahead when Idah pulled back a late consolation, finding the bottom corner with a fine finish from the edge of the area.

That took the Irish youngster's Premier League Two tally to seven goals in nine games for the season – and nine in 14 overall when including his international action with the Republic of Ireland U19s.

Idah limped off in the closing stages on Monday night as well, as City finished a disappointing evening with 10 men and dropped to eighth in the Division Two table.

'It's pretty disappointing,' City U23s boss Gill said afterwards. 'Obviously, the score suggests it was a poor night on our behalf and it was.

'We've had some good performances of late and that was nowhere near like we have been playing so it's very disappointing all-round.

'They pressed us quite high and their all-round pressing game was very aggressive. We struggled with that. We kept playing into that press and it caused us lots of problems.

'The way we played throughout was very disappointing and there's lots to work on when we get back to the training ground.'

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The defeat follows a 1-0 loss to Manchester United at Colney and a 3-0 defeat at Leicester before the international break.

There is a chance to bounce back on Monday in just the second Carrow Road fixture of the U23s' season so far, when Fulham are the visitors (7pm).

'All we can do is bounce back. We've had a couple of weeks without a fixture – that's not an excuse – but obviously we came out a little bit cold,' Gill added, speaking to City's official website.

'With young groups, you do get inconsistent performances and clearly that was the case.

'It's now about going back to the drawing board and getting back to doing the basics right.'

Norwich U23s: McCracken; Kamal, Odusina (C), Jones (Lomas, 77), Richards; Coley, Payne, Aransibia, Scully (Milovanovic, 68); Idah, Spyrou (Thorvaldsson, 77). Unused sub: Johnson (GK)