Matt Briggs is hungry for more match action after making his long-awaited return to Colchester United’s starting line-up.

Briggs made his first appearance of the season for the U’s in their 1-1 draw at Blackpool, having returned from the hip surgery that had cut short his season.

The 25-year-old impressed in a left wing-back role for Colchester at Bloomfield Road, replacing Brennan Dickenson in their starting line-up.

And after playing only his fourth competitive match in the space of 12 months, Briggs was naturally glad to be back.

Briggs said: “I’m hoping that this is the start of many games for me now.

“The fitter I get, the better I’ll be.

“I had an idea I’d play on Thursday that I might be involved when Brennan picked up an injury and they were assessing him.

“When Brennan had a fitness test on Friday, the gaffer just said to me “just be ready to play” and that he had no qualms about me going straight back in.

“Wing-back is a hard role to play but it’s one that I prefer – it’s my type of position because I’m quite attacking.

“It’s been really frustrating being out – my head nearly fell off a couple of times with little setbacks but I stayed strong and I had my family supporting me.

“Football is what I love to do and it’s been very hard just sitting on the sidelines and just having treatment, running and gym every day.

“It really gets to you, especially for that length of time but I’m happy to be back now and hopefully I can just push on and get as many games as I can.

“The boys have really supported me throughout the injury I’ve had and they’re happy for me to be back.”

Briggs played his part in helping Colchester secure a draw at Blackpool and the defender felt they merited their point.

“I thought we had the game’s better chances and we were unlucky not to score a few,” added the former Millwall and Fulham player.

“We dug in deep to get a well-deserved point and the results around us went for us, too.”