DANNY Cowley admits his Colchester United side lacked ‘speed and intensity’ after they battled back to claim a 1-1 draw at Accrington Stanley this afternoon.

But the U’s boss was pleased to see them strike late to claim a point at the Wham Stadium, after a challenging seven days.

Ben Goodliffe came off the bench to rescue a point for Colchester, after Kelsey Mooney had given Accrington a first-half lead in what was a largely scrappy League Two affair.

READ MORE: Match report as Colchester play out draw at Accrington

Cowley said: “I always want to win and we came here with the ambition to win.

“I’ve managed for 16 years and I’ve only ever lost three times on the trot once so I was pleased when we scored, because I didn’t want that again.

“When you look back at the Harrogate game and you look back on this game, to only take one point is disappointing.

“We played against a man to man team today and when you play against really aggressive and competitive, front foot man to man teams, you have to be sharp and intricate with your play.

“We just didn’t have the speed and intensity in our play and that’s why we suffered during the game.

(Image: MATT WILKINSON)

“The game came quickly for us.

“I’ve just said to the players in there that what defines a group when you’ve got a really good group and you’ve got a winning group is how you perform in your third game in a week, particularly when that game is away from home.

“It’s the biggest challenge, for any English football team when you have the mad schedules that we have.

“We looked like we played a Premier League team on Wednesday and had an eight-hour journey (on Friday) – we didn’t play with the intensity, energy and enthusiasm that we would have liked but we were durable and we were resilient.”

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Goodliffe fired home from close range to ensure Colchester a share of the spoils, after coming off the bench ten minutes earlier.

It was the former Sutton United defender’s third goal in as many appearances for the U’s.

“We brought him on because we know of his attacking threat, in the box,” added Cowley.

(Image: MATT WILKINSON)

“We said when we signed him that we wanted eight goals and he’s got three in 90 minutes.

“We had real good dominance of the game at that point and were knocking on the door and it was good to find a goal.

“We scored to try to get it to 1-1 and we tried to win the game but we got caught up in the emotion of the game, I think that’s fair to say.

“We had such ascendency, when we scored and just got over emotional and made some poor tactical decisions that ultimately opened as up, near the end.”