Villa defender Curtis Davies insisted the buck stopped with him after his side's exit from the Carling Cup.

The youngster made his eagerly-awaited debut against Leicester City but a defensive slip gave the Foxes victory in a match which the youngster claimed was "the worst of his life."

Davies was substituted with ten minutes to go and, while his manager and the fans feel the team as a whole lacked the spark which has seen them perform so well in the Premier League, the 22-year-old fears he has blown his big chance to impress manager Martin O'Neill and the supporters.

He said: "I am disappointed. It just didn't happen for me and I really don't know what went wrong."

The centre half, who is on a season-long loan from West Bromwich Albion, refused to use the fact that he has not played competitively for seven months as an excuse. The former Albion skipper suffered a broken metatarsal last season, which meant he missed the Baggies' Coca-Cola Champion-ship play-off final at Wembley, then suffered a hamstring problem in the summer.

The England Under 21 International said: "That is no excuse. I have been training well, I feel good, I feel fit. I am not under a lot of pressure here but that was a poor performance. If it wasn't for that goal, Leicester would never have got through. That was probably the worst game of my life and now I have got to pick myself up and improve."

Davies, who started his career with Luton Town, said: "I just hope it is a one-off and I can prove to the Villa fans, given the chance, that I am a good player.

"On this performance, I haven't given the manager any headaches; Martin Laursen is sure to start the next game (at Tottenham Hotspur on Monday evening) and I will be lucky to be on the bench. Losing was a blow for the team. With respect, this team are more than capable of beating Leicester."

Davies admitted that Leicester, under new manager Gary Megson, had probably deserved their their place in the fourth round. He said: "They were well up for it, as you might expect, but we just didn't live up to our Premiership status.

"I don't think we deserved to win. They were the ones running us. The way Gary Megson likes to play is very effective. At the end of the day we should have been able to deal with the goal but we had hardly any chances before that."

Villa captain Gareth Barry shared the defender's dejection, the England international claiming the defeat had been possibly the team's lowpoint of O'Neill's 13-month reign. But he said it was vital the players put that behind them and started to focus on Monday's trip to White Hart Lane.

Barry (pictured) said: "Losing to Leicester was the worst time for us while the manager has been here. The team was definitely strong enough to beat Leicester at home but they came and battled well and their game-plan played off. There was no spark out there from us, which is strange after some good performances in the league.

"There is a lot of dejection and there still will be tomorrow, but in this game you can't be down for too long - we have got to look to Monday and get our heads up now for Spurs. The Carling Cup was a competition we wanted to go far in this year. We were moaning about wanting a home draw and we thought this was the perfect tie for us - a little derby. We are very disappointed."

Meanwhile, Leicester City's DJ Campbell believes the win can galvanise the club's Championship campaign. The former Birmingham City man said: "That was a sweet victory. The boys dug deep. It was a hard game. They had a lot of the ball and we had to work hard as a team.

"Myself, Stephen Clemence and Bruno N'Gotty got a few boos as ex-Birmingham players but it doesn't really matter because we got the right result. A result like this will give us confidence. To beat a Premier League club away is a great result."