Colchester may have lost to Millwall but they won the hearts of their fans in their first home game in 46 days at Layer Road.

A succession of bad weather had prevented home matches but the game against league leaders Millwall was given the green light after a pitch inspection.

Paul Ifill put Mark McGhee's side ahead after 20 minutes but the U's came back into the match forcing corners at the other end just before half-time and Micky Stockwell was denied by Willy Gueret in the Millwall goal.

Both sides tried hard to play a good game of football despite the muddy conditions.

In the second half the U's continued to press and restricted the visitors to only two break away moves.

Barry Conlon looked dangerous for Colchester and only just had his shot kept out by Gueret.

The best chance for Colchester came during a goal mouth scramble but somehow the ball was kept out leaving the South Londoners with all three points.

For full match report and pictures see tonight's Evening Gazette

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.