The Sky Blues lost narrowly to West Brom in their final home match of the season, with Paul Robinson's first half header separating the sides.
City were reduced to ten men in the opening 45 when youngster Ben Turner - making his first league start for the club - saw red for a late challenge on Kevin Phillips.
City boss Iain Dowie made three changes for the match. Turner was given his first league start for the club in the absence of the injured Robert Page, while midfielder Kevin Thornton also started.
Michael Doyle returned from suspension with winger Liam Davis, who made his first Sky Blues start in last weekend's 2-1 defeat at Sheffield Wednesday, on the substitute's bench.
After an even opening 10, West Brom nearly created a clearcut opportunity in the 12th minute when 22-goal man Diomansy Kamara was played onside by Turner and bore down on goal.
He reached the byline and pulled a ball back to the edge of the six-yard box but thankfully failed to find one of three onrushing Baggies men and Thornton cleared classily to ease the pressure.
Albion - backed by a large, vociferous support - were seeing a lot of the ball but not really hurting the Sky Blues and as the game passed the half hour mark, neither side had forced a genuine shot on goal.
But in the 37th minute the visitors made the pressure tell when skipper Paul Robinson headed past Andy Marshall after the Kevin Phillips' header had rebounded back off the crossbar.
On the stroke of half-time, Turner's afternoon came to a premature end when he was shown the red card by referee Chris Foy. It seemed a harsh decision on the youngster as the challenge on Phillips in the middle third of the pitch was mis-timed rather than malicious, and a yellow card would have perhaps sufficed.
Iain Dowie was forced into a tactical reshuffle at the interval, bringing Liam Davis on for Stephen Hughes as City looked to get something from the tie. With the half five minutes old Marshall made a good block with his legs from a Kamara effort and when the Sky Blues broke, Baggies keeper Dean Kiely made a stunning full stretch save to tip a Dele Adebola thunderbolt onto the angle of post and crossbar.
City were really having a go at their opponents and did not seem to be suffering too much from being a man down. On a number of occasions Michael Mifsud looked to have sprung the Baggies offside trap only to be flagged late by the assistant referee, much to the dislike of the home support.
With 15 minutes remaining Chris Birchall was thrown on in place of Marcus Hall as the Sky Blues threw caution to the wind and switched to a three-man defence. Shortly afterwards Thornton, who had shown his skill and ability in glimpses, came off for Jay Tabb.
In the dying minutes, referee Foy sent Iain Dowie to the stands after the City boss expressed his opinions once to often to the match official and in stoppage time Kamara was red carded after collecting his second booking in the space of ten minutes.
The Sky Blues failed to find the elusive equaliser but could take credit for a passionate second half performance when they really took the game to their play-off chasing rivals.
City: Marshall; McNamee, Ward (c), Turner, Hall (Birchall 75); Osbourne; Hughes (Davis 46), Thornton (Tabb 79), Doyle; Mifsud, Adebola. Subs (not used): Steele (GK), Kyle,
Sent-off: Turner (45)
WBA: Kiely; Sodje, McShane, Perry, Robinson (c); Chaplow (Koren 89), Greening, Koumas, Gera, Phillips (MacDonald 81), Kamara. Subs (not used): Daniels (GK), Ellington, Albrechtsen
Booked: Kamara (82 & 90)
Referee: Mr C Foy
Attendance: 26,343 (6,411)
