A six minute double from Burton's Deji Oshilaja and Davis Keilor-Dunn condemned City to a 2-0 loss at home for only their second home defeat in the league this season.
After Tuesday's loss away to Shrewsbury, manager Matt Taylor made three changes to the starting XI with Alex Hartridge, Matt Jay and Jay Stansfield making his full debut coming in to replace Jack Sparkes, Harry Kite and Sam Nombe respectively.
After an impeccably observed minutes silence in memory of Her late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and an emphatic rendition of the national anthem, the game got underway.
With only 15 minutes played City were very much the team on top with Josh Key making a massive nuisance down the right hand side, finding Stansfield and Brown.
After a frantic opening quarter of an hour, the next 15 minutes slowed down quite a bit, City were still in control of the football, but the visitors were starting to get into the game. Forcing a point blank save from Blackman in the City goal.
A little over half an hour on the clock Stansfield once again found himself behind the Burton defensive line, but unselfishly cut the ball back to the edge of the area. After playing around on the edge of the area, the ball found Jonathan Grounds on the left hand side but his cross ended up only finding the stand behind the goal. The Grecians were still very much bringing the pressure late in the first half.
Burton were not taking all of the pressure lying down though, with their corners causing trouble in City’s penalty area. The ball was bouncing around like a pin ball in front of Blackman but thankfully the ball was cleared away and the game remained goalless.
Right on the cusp of half time an unbelievable sliding challenge from Hartridge led to a Burton corner, with said corner resulting in Key blocking the ball on the goal line. A real heart in mouths moment for the City defence, but the sides went into the break level.
At the start of the second half, Taylor made one change with Kite coming on to replace Grounds - who picked up a muscle strain - resulting in a change of formation.
City came out of the blocks with a vengeance with the ball finding the back of the net after only three minutes of the second half played. But much to the annoyance of the Grecians, Matt Jay was offside in the build up to the goal, ruling out a first goal of the season for Stansfield. Footage suggested City were unfortunate, with the City skipper seemingly onside when the ball was played.
With 57 minutes gone the Big Bank almost exploded once again, half time replacement Kite found the ball on the right hand side and after a jinxing run past the Burton full back, the ball found Stansfield who’s effort was just about blocked on the line.
Completely against the run of play City found themselves 1-0 down in the 63rd minute. A mistake in the area saw the ball fall to Oshilaja in too much space and he slotted the ball past Blackman in the City net.
The winless visitors soon doubled their lead within six minutes. After another set piece into the box, City failed to deal with it again, this time Keilor-Dunn converted from close range.
City huffed and puffed in the final quarter, but were unable to find the back of the net, meaning Burton picked up their first win of the season.
The next game for City is an away trip to Forest Green, for an early televised kick off at The New Lawn Stadium on Saturday 24 September.
City: Blackman, Caprice (Sparkes), Sweeney, Hartridge, Grounds (Kite), Key, Harper, Collins, Jay (C) (Nombe), Brown, Stansfield (Smith)
Subs not used: Brown, Chauke, Cox
Burton Albion: Garrett, Brayford (C), Borthwick-Jackson, Oshilaja, Hughes, Powell, Keilor-Dunn (Carayol), Abeboyejo (Winnall), Taylor, Gilligan (Butcher), Hamer
Subs not used: Sinisalo, Onyango, Thorpe, Lakin,
Referee: Neil Hair
Attendance: 6185 (146 away)