Frankie Kent insists he will not get too ahead of himself despite making a long-awaited return to Colchester United’s starting line-up.

Kent chalked up his first U’s league start in nearly 11 months after helping them register a 2-1 win over Gillingham, last weekend.

The 19-year-old centre-half sat out much of the last campaign with a troublesome knee injury.

The U’s academy product admits his league return was a moment he had been looking forward to for a long time - but insists he will not get carried away.

Kent told the Daily Gazette: “I’ll just keep working hard in training and I’m not getting too ahead of myself.

“It’s my first game in a while and I’ll just try and knuckle down and stay confident in myself.

“I just want to try and build on it and whether I’m in the team next week, the week after or the week after I just need to focus on staying fit and pushing for a place.

“It’d been a long time and I’d be looking forward to it, so to get 90 minutes under my belt was brilliant.

“I had a bit of a shaky start to the game and I was really nervous.

“The first goal was my fault and I had to build on that and stay focused on the game and try and help the team as much as I could.

“But it was a great result and team performance and the team did brilliantly to get the result against a good team.”

Kent said it was important Colchester defended well in the second half against Gillingham, in order to secure a second successive win.

The Gills attack put the U’s back four under plenty of pressure in the first half.

But inspired by Kent, the hosts produced a solid defensive display after half-time to seal another victory.

“Something the manager said at half-time was make sure we stay tight,” said Kent, who came on as a second-half substitute at Sheffield United, last week.

“At the start of the season, there were games where we’d been put under pressure and perhaps we were too open.

“It’s something we’ve been focusing on in training.

“With the results and the goals that we’ve been conceding, we knew that it was very important to stay in the game and defend well.”

For all of the latest Colchester United news, see the Daily Gazette.