Accrington boss John Doolan saluted the togetherness of his team after they won 2-0 at Colchester to claim back-to-back victories in League Two.
Shaun Whalley’s double sealed a deserved victory for the Reds on the road that moved them five points clear of the relegation zone.
Accrington took an 18th-minute lead when Whalley scored from the spot having been brought down by Tom Flanagan and he doubled their advantage in the 59th minute when he controlled Josh Woods’ delivery from the right before firing home.
Doolan said: “It’s back to back wins and it’s perfect.
“We wanted to follow up our good work last week (against Grimsby) and the lads have shown that today.
“I keep going on about the togetherness of the dressing room and the outside noise and not getting influenced from other people and everything else.
“We know what we’ve got, we know what we’ve brought to the club and we’ll stay together and you can see the reward.
“Colchester are a good side and they don’t come away from what they do and how they go about it.
“We came up with a plan and sacrificed a little bit of possession and then sort of set traps and that worked and the press worked. Everything worked.
“We started the game really well and I think it was coming, so I was really pleased with that.
“I don’t think (goalkeeper) Billy (Crellin) has had anything to do.”
Colchester suffered a second successive defeat and failed to register a shot on target.
U’s boss Danny Cowley said: “It was a really disappointing day for us as a football club.
“We have to credit Accrington, because I think they played with a real intensity and aggression, they play man to man, so you have to try to outplay them and outwit them.
“In the first half, we actually got in behind them so many times but we lacked quality, once we got into the final third and didn’t make the most of those moments.
“We had a really good end to 2024 and made some really good strides forward.
“But we beat ourselves on New Year’s Day against Swindon and today was well short of a performance that I think we would accept and in terms of what we are and what we stand for.
“I can understand some technical errors that you make against a really aggressive team that rush you and put you under a lot of pressure and on a difficult surface but then it’s about your mindset and the way you respond and react to that and that probably wasn’t good enough from us today.”
