Some sloppy play saw the southern side concede goals to Stephen Hoyle and Andre de Jong in the fifth and 61st minutes, although it was otherwise competitive.
Coach Paul O’Reilly remained happy with how things were tracking ahead of the team’s first league match against Hamilton Wanderers this Saturday.
"It was, as expected, a tough test,’’ he said.
"They’re pretty strong, I think they’re going to be in the top four, probably competing for a top two place realistically.
"Defensively we were quite solid. Obviously we got beaten 2-0, but they didn’t break us down a lot. They didn’t have a lot of chances in the game, which is good for us."
The side had plenty of possession and was disappointed to go into halftime trailing.
However, it could not capitalise on its opportunities.
Stephen Last went close off two corners, Chris Kessell hit the cross-bar and Harley Rodeka had a near miss.
"The area to improve for us is in the final third. We did have some good possession, but we definitely didn’t do enough with it.
"We didn’t have enough chances in the game; we didn’t break them down enough.
"Some of that was a little bit of poor play for us, some of that was that they are pretty strong defensively."
With the first game of the season this weekend against Hamilton, the team was continuing to gel.
"We’re hopeful we can get a big result against Hamilton in game one.
"They look strong; they went through pre-season without losing a game. They beat Eastern Suburbs last week 2-1, which is a big result because Eastern Suburbs will be quite strong.
"We’re disappointed that we didn’t get the result [today] and I think that shows where we’re at now. We’re actually walking away from a game against a team that finished in a playoff place last year and we’re disappointed they beat us.
"There’s a bit of belief in the squad we can get some results.
"But realistically as well, we are fairly new. I think we’ve got 12 new players in the squad this year and it’s going to take time for that to gel."
