Colchester United played out a draw with Oldham Athletic

Noah Chilvers' deflected strike cancelled out Davis Keillor-Dunn's first-half goal for the Latics, as the League Two basement battle finished all square.

Having trailed at the break, Colchester were the better side in the second half and looked the more likely side to claim a precious win, at the JobServe Community Stadium.

Brown said: “I thought it was a good performance.

“You play the game and you want the wins, of course you do.

“But if you do everything you possibly can do to try and achieve those wins and they don’t come, you can’t argue.

“The performance was there from the lads and we’ve got to keep them going.

“We asked for a reaction from the lads, after you find yourselves 1-0 down in a game of football.

“Their goal was disappointing, because five of their last ten goals have been from set plays and (Carl) Piergianni gets first contact on all of them.

“We tried to address that during the week leading up to the game but unfortunately he got first contact and then it’s the second ball and it was poor reactions.

“I didn’t think we were horrendous in the first half by any stretch.

“We had opportunities and we were still taking the game to them but it was a more even affair than the second half was.

“We asked for a reaction from the lads and we identified that we could get in behind their left-back, down the side of Piergianni.

“I thought O (Owura) Edwards was absolutely tremendous in his work ethic, to get into those areas.

“On a different day, we score three goals.

“We do get a bit of luck with the goal but I think we deserved that a little bit.

“We just need that killer touch in the final third."

Luke Hannant, Alan Judge and Freddie Sears all came close to scoring a winner for Colchester, after Chilvers' equaliser.

“The lads rolled their sleeves up and took the game to Oldham, in the second half and had a right good go and it was the exact response that we were after," said Brown.

“I thought we made their keeper work on a number of occasions in the second half.

“We had loads of territory and were getting into good areas.

“We could be sitting here with three points but we’re not – we’re sitting here with one and it’s important we do everything we can to win the game which I thought we did today.

“I thought there was only one team looking to win it but we certainly don’t lose it, especially against teams in and around us."

The introduction of leading scorer Sears at half-time made a difference for Colchester, in the second half.

The former West Ham United striker was left on the bench for the Oldham clash but came on as a substitute for John Akinde.

Brown said: “Freddie came on and I thought he did well.

“He was full of energy and he gave us a little bit of a different dimension that what John (Akinde) does.

“We felt that we just had to mix it up a little bit and if I’m honest, I thought it paid dividends."