Alex Gilbey admitted that the players were to blame for Colchester United’s latest defeat, at Doncaster, due to their failure to “take on board” the instructions laid down by the management team.

The U’s have slipped to 17th in the table, on the back of three straight away defeats, following last Saturday’s 2-0 defeat at the Keepmoat Stadium.

Tony Humes’ men now have a fortnight’s break from League One action, and can instead concentrate on this Saturday’s potential banana skin in the FA Cup at non-league Wealdstone.

But they will need to stick to a game-plan, and team tactics, if they are not to come unstuck again.

“We came slow out of the blocks, at the start of the second half against Doncaster,” said midfielder Gilbey.

“And I think the players have got to take the full blame for that.

“They grasped the instructions before the game, and yet we didn’t take the instructions on board. That wasn’t good enough.

“Their keeper (Thorsten Stuckmann) pulled off a few worldly saves, and he had a great game, which is fair play to him.

“But as the gaffer (Humes) said to us before the game – ‘look at the size of their keeper, and just put it in the bottom corner.’

“And yet every shot and header we had, seemed to go in the top corner, which was a good height for him.

“We need to work on things like that, and get better than that,” added Gilbey.

Even though this weekend’s hosts, Wealdstone, are a National League South outfit – the U’s thrashed Gosport Borough, from the same league, 6-3 away from home in the first round of the FA Cup last year – Gilbey is anticipating a tough encounter in West London.

“It’s the FA Cup now, and that’s going to be a real tough one,” insisted 20-year-old Gilbey.

“It’s not going to be easy, playing at their place.

“We’ve got to go there and put on a professional job, and put on a show.

“We have got to be 100% on it, and everyone has to be on the same page, which was something that did not happen at Doncaster. We weren’t quite good enough.

“If you look at the Wigan game (5-0 defeat), I thought that was a disgraceful performance, all the lads said that.

“Against Doncaster we controlled the game too much into thinking that it was ‘nearly’ going to come.

“I kept thinking in the first half that we were going to score in a minute, and it should have been three or four in the first half, yet it just wasn’t good enough.

“It keeps happening, us controlling the first half, like at Shrewsbury when we were 2-0 up and cruising, and yet still lost. I don’t know why it keeps happening.

“We controlled the game (at Doncaster) here and yet came away with no points. It’s something we have got to work on.”