Gavin Massey is confident that Colchester United can climb out of the relegation mire and avoid relegation to League Two.

But the U’s attacker says that must start making their home games count – starting with tonight’s crunch meeting with fellow strugglers Fleetwood Town.

Colchester remain five points adrift of safety in League One following their 2-1 defeat against Sheffield United and have not won in the league since mid-October.

But having helped the U’s successfully avoid the drop in each of the last three seasons, winger Massey is adamant that they can stay up again.

He said: “We’ve done it before on numerous occasions and I can’t see why we can’t do it again, with arguably a better group of players with more quality.

“We know that we have a task on our hands and we’ll be looking to put it right.

“With the group of players that we have, it’s hard to see how we’ve gone on such a run in the league.

“Maybe the performances earlier in the season are why we’re in this situation but the new gaffer has put his points across and we’re taking them on board.

“I don’t think that it’s a big ask with this group of players – we have a few home games coming up and we have to make this place into a fortress like we have done before and start climbing the table, starting against Fleetwood.

“We can’t dwell on the last result and I don’t think it’ll be hard to pick ourselves up, not with this group of players.

“It’s a massive game for us against Fleetwood - they’re not too far above us so we’re looking to get three points.”

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