A dejected Terry Brown has urged his AFC Wimbledon side to grow from their FA Cup disappointment after the Dons crashed to a 4-1 defeat at Millwall on Monday night.

Despite holding the League One promotion hopefuls for close to 50 minutes, and threatening a replay when Lewis Taylor struck late on, Wimbledon were killed off by two goals in the last five minutes.

And Brown admits the defeat was a bitter pill to swallow.

He said: “I am really disappointed and the scoreline did not do us justice.

“I am very, very proud of my players but that is tinged with a disappointment that we have been gallant losers once again.

“For a lot of the players this was the biggest game of their lives and it is all part of a big learning curve for us.

“But it is only a learning curve if you take on board the mistakes you have made and correct them.”

The Dons started brightly and despite having to chase the game for much of the first half fashioned the best opening when Danny Kedwell scuffed a shot inches wide having beaten the offside trap.

But as the game got stretched in the second half Brown’s men were punished, although Taylor’s cool finish after a neat backheel from Kedwell did give the sniff of an upset.

Brown added: “We were trying to fling people forward at the end of the game and that is when the quality they possess did for us.

“I think the major difference between us was experience - the majority of our players have hardly any Conference experience, let alone League football.

“We have to remember that we held a very good League One side for the best part of an hour, and there were an awful lot of things we did right.”

Wimbledon make the arduous trek to Barrow this weekend as they get back to Blue Square Premier action.

And Brown has targeted a defensive improvement as his top priority.

He added: “We have to start keeping clean sheets and we have not been able to do that for a couple of months.

“At Millwall we were quite sloppy at times and we gave them a couple of goals.

“Now it is all about picking ourselves up for the game at Barrow and getting back on track.”

AFC Wimbledon’s next three matches: Nov 14 Barrow (a), 21 York City (h), 24 Ebbsfleet United (h)