MICHAEL Duff admits he was frustrated his Cheltenham Town side did not go on and claim victory over Colchester United following the 1-1 draw at Whaddon Road.

But the Robins manager admits his team came against a 'good' U's side, managed by his former Burnley team-mate John McGreal.

Conor Thomas's penalty scored with 20 minutes to go ensured the spoils were shared, after Luke Norris had given Colchester a first-half lead.

Duff said: "They're a good team and they've beaten Premier League teams this year.

"That probably shows you, the way they've had to end up defending against us, that we're not a bad team.

"That's what we need to embrace, the challenge, because they are a good team.

"I don't know whether we should have won it but we could have won it.

"Once they got the early goal they just sat in and made it hard to try and play through. "I don't think we missed a load of chances but the ball didn't quite fall for us and we played some really good football.

"They are a good team, make no mistake.

"It's slightly frustrating because when we did get the goal there was a lot of time left and we thought we could go on and win it.

"Overall, you take the performance all the time and you don't always get what you deserve.

"We played on Tuesday night (against Swindon) and maybe rode our luck a bit and today it's gone the other way. "That's the way it is but I'll take that performance every day of the week."

With his Cheltenham side trailing at the break Duff made a double change at half-time, sending on Reuben Reid and Gavin Reilly.

It paid dividends with Reid winning the controversial penalty that led to the hosts earning a point.

Duff added: "We needed to get hold of it a bit better.

"We moved the ball quite well in the back third and the middle third but we couldn't quite get it into the two centre forwards' feet quickly enough to get runners off them.

"That's why we brought Reuben (Reid) in and he probably showed in 45 minutes why he's been brought in, for that type of thing.

"Gav (Reilly) is an intelligent player, with good movement as well.

"They were banked in that deep, we weren't going to get in behind them and we needed something different."