Derry City bowed out at the first round of Europa Conference League qualifying after a 2-0 second leg defeat against Riga FC in Latvia.

James Akintunde should have opened the scoring for Derry before Gabriel Ramos put the home side in front.

The Brazilian added a sublime second on 76 minutes as Ruaidhri Higgins’ side exited losing 4-0 on aggregate.

Derry City’s wait for a win over two legs in Europe goes on but things may have been different had they made the most of their fast start in Riga.

Thirteen years on from a 1-1 draw in the same city, Akintunde spurned a gilt-edged chance to halve the deficit when eyeball-to-eyeball with Nils Purins in the Riga goal.

Danny Lafferty crashed an effort into the side netting but Derry found themselves behind when in a carbon copy of last week’s opener Douglas Aurelio pulled a cross back into the area and Ramos latched on to the ball to fire past Brian Maher.

Purins gifted Brandon Kavanagh an opportunity to equalise but his attempt just sailed over as the Foylesiders went in 1-0 behind.

Not since a 9-0 aggregate win over Aberystwyth Town back in 2014 have Derry advanced through a European tie and they were on course for a fifth consecutive exit.

Will Patching rattled the crossbar from inside the area as they continued to battle in the second period.

However, with less than quarter of an hour remaining the peerless Ramos scurried down the left, shifted inside and curled in a beauty from the corner of the box to make it 2-0 on the night and 4-0 on aggregate.

Amid the defeat there was a welcome return to action for Michael Duffy who will be in line to feature when City return to League of Ireland action in the north west derby with Finn Harps this Sunday in Ballybofey.