COLCHESTER United boss John McGreal has challenged his players to notch back-to-back league wins for the first time this season.

Despite their strong start to the campaign, the U’s have only won consecutive matches on one occasion - when they followed up their Checkatrade Trophy success against Southend United with maximum points at home to Crawley Town, on Saturday.

Now they are setting their sights on back-to-back league wins as they strive to build on the Crawley result at Morecambe tomorrow (kick-off 3pm).

“It’s how you react to getting beaten and it will be nice now to go back-to-back with wins,” said McGreal.

“We’ve done it with a cup game, but it would be great to do it now with the league.

“That is the challenge we are putting in place for our boys, but we know it will be tough because opposition managers are doing what they have to with their team.

“What we can control is what we put in on the training pitch and hopefully we can replicate that on a game day.

“We know it’ll be a tough game at Morecambe, though.

“We haven’t beaten them in the four times we’ve played them.

“They’ve all been tight games and it shows that this division is tight, so we’re expecting another one like that this time.

“It’s up to us to go up there and get a result.”

Colchester are sixth in the League Two table while Morecambe are down in 17th, with just four wins from their 13 matches.

Nevertheless, McGreal is taking nothing for granted and believes that generally speaking, the quality of football in the division is on the up - making every game difficult.

“I look at the standard of football in this division and think it’s improving, in terms of the managers and coaching staff and the tactics they’re bringing in during games,” he said.

“You see things being changed in games and I think you can give a lot of credit to the football you see in League Two. We’re still early on, but we’re coming into three tough games and it’s the same-old, same-old from me really.

“It’s one game at a time and three points at stake.

“There’s plenty of time to make up ground if you have to, but there’s also plenty of time that games can get away from you so it’s one where we need to be on the money.”