DANNY Cowley admits injuries have deprived his Colchester United side of some of the physicality and athleticism required to compete in League Two.
The U’s slumped to a 4-2 defeat at Fleetwood Town at the weekend, extending their winless run to seven matches and leaving them three points above the relegation zone.
Colchester have had a number of players unavailable for a prolonged period, with Ellis Iandolo, Will Goodwin, Ben Perry, Tom Flanagan, Dom Gape, Jack Baldwin and Adrian Akande all currently sidelined and winger Owura Edwards serving a suspension.
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Colchester twice relinquished a lead to lose at Fleetwood having been in command at half-time and boss Cowley said: “We’ve got eight important players out.
“The hardest bit is the characteristics of those players.
“Ben Perry, Ellis Iandolo, Tom Flanagan, Will Goodwin, just to name a few.
“The players that are injured have similar characteristics in that we lose some athleticism and physicality with the players that are injured and Owura Edwards, who’s suspended.
“They all have certain physical characteristics that are really important to the balance and dynamic of our team and we’re really short of the physicality that we need.
“We’re missing those players, of course, and also, they are leaders and big characters.
“We didn’t miss them in the first half [at Fleetwood] because we played with really good control and rhythm.
“But in the second half, we just couldn’t maintain it and we have to go away and look at that.
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“It’s frustrating for us and it makes it even more infuriating for us because it becomes really hard to manage when you get such different level of performance.”
Colchester are currently suffering from inconsistency both from an individual and team perspective and Cowley says that player reliability is a big factor they are striving for.
Cowley said: “I’ve managed in eight of the top nine divisions and everyone asks me what the difference is between the ninth-tier player and the second-tier player and it really is consistency.
“The ninth-tier player can do something brilliant – they just don’t do it as often as the players in the Championship.
“It’s the same with the young players; the experienced players that have lived it a lot longer just know how to build a performance sometimes and our young ones are just learning that – that’s the journey that ultimately they’re on.
“We’ve just got a lot of young ones who we’re trying to get to be a bit more reliable and a bit more consistent.
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“It’s really hard, because all of a sudden they’ve stepped to the next level where they were under-21 player or a bit part player – now they have a bigger responsibility in the squad.
“They have to work at being more reliable and more consistent because they can bring some real highs but we need to keep working with them.
“It’s to be expected for the young player; that’s their journey.”
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