Middlesbrough boss Michael Carrick was proud of his players in their FA Cup defeat to Aston Villa.

Villa won 1-0 at the Riverside stadium thanks to Matty Cash's late goal.

Carrick said: "You can't feel sorry for yourself, football is football but I was hugely proud of the boys today, I thought tactically we were really good, in terms of the discipline, we stuck with it against a team who are up there with the best around at the moment so we knew it was going to be a tough test and they unloaded the bench with the cavalry towards the end and we stuck with it.

"We were in it, we had moments, I thought at times we showed really good quality to play out of the pressure and take the ball and have that confidence even though we obviously had to defend for spells but we knew they were good at set plays and that's where the majority of their chances came from. "

On Villa's substitutions, he added: "I took that as a real positive, whether it was planned for them or not, I don't know but they wanted to win the game like ourselves we were right into, we were growing into it. I can't fault the boys, I thought they were terrific today. I'm really really proud of them."