TOMMY Smith was forced to sit out Colchester United's 1-1 draw with Mansfield Town because of a back issue.

The U's skipper (pictured below) missed the U's League Two clash with the Stags at the JobServe Community Stadium, after suffering the ailment on Monday.

Colchester boss Hayden Mullins said: “Tommy jarred his back (on Monday) right at the beginning of training.

“He didn’t train and we were waiting to see if it was better.

“He came in (on Tuesday) and said ‘yeah, it feels better’.

“I took the decision out of his hands and decided to keep him out of the game.

“I think it’s proved to be the right one because with Easty (Tom Eastman) going down and if (Tommy) had played and wasn’t quite right and he went down too, we’d be really down.

“Hopefully Tommy will be training on Thursday."

Gazette:

Colchester suffered two other defensive injuries during their draw with Mansfield.

Long-serving defender Tom Eastman (pictured below) was forced off with what appeared to be a hamstring injury in the first half of the Stags clash.

And then left-back Ryan Clampin also limped off after rolling his ankle during the second half of the game.

Colchester will assess the trio further at Florence Park, as they prepare for their trip to play Oldham Athletic at Boundary Park, on Saturday.

Gazette:

The U's battled back to rescue a point after Freddie Sears struck home a penalty for them in the fifth minute of stoppage-time.

They had trailed to Elliott Hewitt's 73rd-minute header and it had looked as though they were on course to suffer a second successive home defeat.

Mullins added: “In the end, it’s a good point because we were a minute away from losing.

“We know the parts of the game we need to look after.

“We’re early on in the season; it’s not getting carried away with anything but we know there’s areas of our game that we need to tidy up."