Borussia Dortmund coach Thomas Tuchel admitted his side were not good enough to beat Bayern Munich after Saturday's 5-1 setback on Sunday.
Bayern maintained their 100 percent record and pulled seven points clear of Dortmund, their closest rivals in the Bundesliga table.
Before the game, Tuchel did not want to entertain the idea of his side being title candidates, and he was even more convinced by that after.
"We've got to accept that we were not good enough," said the Dortmund coach. "Congratulations to Bayern -- they deserved to win."
The international break means Bayern will have to wait a fortnight before getting the opportunity to make it nine wins out of nine when they travel to Werder Bremen.
Dortmund, meanwhile, have plenty of time to assess what went wrong and what still needs to be done to move into Bayern's league before they travel to Tuchel's ex-club Mainz on Oct. 16.
"We've got to shake ourselves and start over," said Tuchel. "That's vitally necessary now."
The loss was Bayern's first of the season, but comes after a string of three straight draws -- two in the laegue and one in the Europa League.
Dortmund captain Mats Hummels said he was getting tired of dropping points.
"We have dropped points on three consecutive matchdays now," Hummels said. "That's really annoying. We're focusing on ourselves. You can accept losing a match in Munich. But it hurts to lose after conceding five."
But Hummels defended Dortmund's performance despite the lopsided scoreline.
"When I say what I'm about to say, everyone will say: 'Is he out of his mind?' But I don't think we put in a bad performance today," he said. "There have been no other teams this season that have caused danger in front of Bayern's goal so often.
"We just weren't clinical enough and now we need to make sure that we get back to winning ways. We need to bounce back against Mainz on the Friday after the international break."