George Elokobi knew there was no way Solihull Moors would take Maidstone lightly in the FA Cup first round.

The Stones made headlines all over the world last season after making the last 16 as a National League South club.

But they fell in round one yesterday, with their higher-league opponents showing their quality in a 3-0 victory.

Two of the goals came late but Moors, National League play-off finalists last season, were worthy winners against a Stones outfit who never gave up but lacked a cutting edge.

Boss Elokobi feels Maidstone have had a target on their backs ever since last season’s heroics, which included a 2-1 win at Premier-League Ipswich Town in the fourth round.

“I think Andy (Whing, Solihull boss and ex-Coventry defender) is doing a great job here with his management team and the players,” said Elokobi.

“It’s about respect and respecting the competition and I’m sure they need the finances as much as we do for progressing to the next round.

Report: Solihull Moors 3-0 Maidstone United

“But, of course, it’s not just Solihull Moors that show us respect, it’s everyone that comes up against Maidstone.

“I said this in the summer and I’m still going to say it, teams are raising their game by 10-15% and we have to deal with that as a football club, based on what we did last season.

“But that’s history now, we’ve been beaten well and congratulations to Solihull Moors.

“We approached this game to try and progress and that’s how we prepared the team, not to just come here and sit back and get beat.

“No, we competed to try and get our football club and our community into the second round of the FA Cup but it wasn’t to be today.”

Elokobi felt Maidstone could get at their West Midlands opponents.

But they didn’t work keeper Laurie Walker all afternoon and fell to three second-half goals.

James Clarke finished a loose ball following a double save by Alexis Andre Jr, Jack Stevens added a penalty and ex-Gillingham striker Conor Wilkinson made it three from an injury-time counter-attack.

“We looked at the wide areas,” said Elokobi, whose side were backed by 601 away fans in a crowd of just over 1,800.

“We set out knowing that we could exploit the wide areas.

“It was important we came into the game with a plan.

“In the first half you saw that we got in the wide areas a couple of times and put in some crosses but we were just lacking bodies in and around the six-yard box.

“I thought we faded in the second half a little bit when the players started getting a bit of fatigue.

“We haven’t played on grass for such a long time and sometimes that takes its toll on the bodies (Maidstone played seven successive games on 3G before a much-changed side lost at Welling in the Kent Senior Cup on Tuesday).

“But the boys did everything they could in terms of following the strategy and towards the end we were expansive because we were trying to get a goal at least to send our fans home happy.

“If we didn’t win at least we could get a goal but it wasn’t to be and that’s the disappointing side of it but it’s all right.”

Maidstone are back in National League South action at Dorking on Tuesday night.