They were missing their Wallabies stars, and still pushed defending champion Queensland to the limit.
But in a sign of the ACT Brumbies' newfound confidence, prop Ben Alexander has declared honourable defeats won't be tolerated by the new-look class of 2012.
Alexander and fellow international forward Stephen Moore both succumbed to early injuries in a 27-20 trial loss to the Reds in Cairns on Saturday.
The Brumbies' other Wallaby, Pat McCabe, also didn't play after undergoing shoulder surgery after the World Cup.
However, Alexander wasn't offering any excuses, insisting the side was shattered after failing to secure back-to-back wins following last week's 25-0 defeat of Western Force.
''We're not happy with giving any side a run for their money,'' Alexander said yesterday.
''Maybe the general public doesn't think we'll go well and we should be happy with how we played ... well we're not.
''We're only happy when we win, and we have very high expectations as a group.
''We felt we deserved to beat them and we put them under a lot of pressure, but they're the champions and we have a bit of work to do.''
The Brumbies finished 13th last season, and made sweeping changes to their roster in a bid to bounce back this year.
Alexander admitted the Reds match was a more realistic gauge of how the side was travelling ahead of its home season opener against the Force on February 24. ''We definitely got tested a lot more than the week before,'' he said.
''The core things we've been working on went really well, but we did get exposed in some areas, and it's good to find that out now so we can work on it before round one.''
There were plenty of good signs for coach Jake White, particularly the effort of his youthful second-half side which was competitive against an experienced Reds outfit boasting Wallabies big guns Will Genia, James Horwill and Digby Ioane.
Wingers Joe Tomane and Henry Speight produced some eye-catching first-half breaks but poor back-line handling cost the visitors on the Reds line, which flanker Michael Hooper finally breached in the second half.
''I thought we rushed it a bit [in attack],'' White said. ''We tried to be a little bit over-eager. That comes, I'm not unhappy about that. We had some opportunities to score some tries, and the Reds are a very good defensive side.'' with AAP
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