The ACT NPL premiers were no match for their NSW counterparts Blacktown City, going down 4-1 at the Lilys Football Centre at Seven Hills on Sunday.

Having qualified for the competition having won the league championship, Canberra FC was aiming to gain retribution for last weekend's 3-1 grand final loss to Canberra Olympic.

Canberra FC suffered a narrow loss to Sydney United 58 in the tournament's inaugural edition in 2013 before the Cooma Tigers FC were smashed 6-1 by the Bonnyrigg White Eagles last year.

With Blacktown City having six players with A-League experience in their squad, Canberra FC coach Zoran Glavinic said he would prefer if the finals fixture was changed.

"It's a great concept, but I would rather not have to play a Sydney team every year," Glavinic said.

"They [Blacktown] were very good today, but we were no chance of coming back after giving away those two early goals.

"It was an extremely disappointing start by us and something we need to work on."

Canberra FC were down 2-0 after 12 minutes from goals from former Sydney FC striker Mitch Mallia and Patrick Antelmi.

The match was as good as over in the 31st minute as Joseph Gibbs beat the offside trap and set up Travis Major for an easy finish into the empty net for Blacktown to go up 3-0.

Antelmi was shown a red card for a strong challenge on James Field to reduce Blacktown to 10 players at the end of the first half.

Any slim hope Canberra FC had of getting back in the game disappeared when English striker Thomas James was sent off for dissent in the 49th minute.

Canberra FC goalkeeper Sam Brown was called into action with three saves in a row, but Gibbs capitalised on the fourth to make it 4-0 in the 67th minute.

Canberra FC scored a consolation goal in the 89th minute, with Daniel Subasic finishing off a lovely ball from Nikola Barisic.

BLACKTOWN CITY 4 (Mitchell Mallia 4, Patrick Antelmi 12, Travis Major 31, Joseph Gibbs 67) bt CANBERRA FC 1 (Daniel Subasic 89) at Lilys Football Centre on Sunday.