COLCHESTER United captain Tommy Smith admits 'small margins' in games are currently costing them – but insists they are striving to get results for both the club and for the fans.

The U’s are 19th in League Two following their 3-0 defeat at Port Vale and have won only one of their last seven league matches.

Colchester report back to training today ahead of their home clash with Sutton United tomorrow night and Smith says they will be looking for a rapid response.

Smith said: “All of us are striving to get those results for the fans and for the club.

“It’s not where we want to be at the moment – we all know that.

“But the encouraging signs are that we can get goals and I think it’s only a matter of time before we put three or four past a team and hopefully, that starts on Tuesday.

“The small margins aren’t going for us, at the moment.

“There was Brendan (Wiredu’s) header which went an inch wide, Noah (Chilvers’) shot which was an inch over the bar.

“They got a deflected goal, our deflections go straight into the keeper’s hands.

“But we just need to keep plugging away - if we were conceding goals like that and not creating chances, we’d be a lot more worried.

“It’s frustrating – that’s probably the emotion.

“We know that we’ve done more than enough to score goals but we haven’t done that and we’ve been punished for that.

“It was another long trip for the fans and credit to them for making the journey.

“They made a lot of noise for us and we’re sad and frustrated that we haven’t given them something to take home.

“But we’ll go again on Tuesday and try and put it right.

“The games come around fast and that’s the league – we had a good week last week with a win and a draw.

“We need to put the Port Vale game to bed, kick on, recover and bounce back with a good result on Tuesday.

“We want to take as many points from our home matches as possible, so it’s another chance for us to do that.”

Gazette:

Colchester found themselves 2-0 at high-flying Port Vale after 16 minutes, following goals from James Gibbons and James Wilson had put the hosts in command.

And after the likes of Freddie Sears, Brendan Wiredu and Noah Chilvers had gone close, the U’s were left with it all to do after substitute Aaron Martin made it 3-0, on the hour mark.

“It’s a bit of a double-edged sword,” said former Ipswich Town defender Smith.

“We don’t want to be conceding goals but we need to be taking our chances.

“Conceding three goals away from home is never nice but we felt like we had enough chances to win a game of football.

“It was tough going 2-0 down early on but we had chances after that and had we nicked one, they’d have been on the back foot straight away.

“We had more than enough chances to have won the game but we also need to make it more solid, at the back.

“Port Vale are a good team and they are where they are in the league for a reason.

“But we caused them all sorts of problems ourselves – their chances dropped into the back of the net and ours didn’t.”

Smith returned to the Colchester starting line-up against Port Vale for the first time in four matches at Port Vale.

The 31-year-old had to be content with a place on the U’s bench for the two games prior to the Vale Park trip, having missed their defeat at Tranmere Rovers earlier this month after reporting for international duty with New Zealand.

Smith added: “It’s always nice to be back in the team.

“I’m disappointed with the result but it’s a privilege and an honour every time you get the chance to take to the field in a professional game of football.”