DANNY Cowley admits Colchester United's poor performance against Cheltenham Town was 'well short' of what he expects after they were beaten 2-1 at the JobServe Community Stadium.

The U's slumped to a disappointing home defeat and have now dropped to 20th in the League Two table, after the Robins claimed their first away league win of the season.

Lyle Taylor's well-taken goal proved only a consolation for Colchester, as first-half goals either side of that from Jordan Thomas clinched the Robins' victory.

READ MORE: Match report as Colchester crash to defeat against Cheltenham

U's head coach Cowley said: "There's a lot of disappointment.

“I am disappointed in myself, I’m disappointed in the players and I’m disappointed for the supporters, because they’ve had four years of this kind of level of performance.

“It was well short of what I expect from my teams and it hurts a lot.

“It’s my team and I take complete ownership and responsibility for that, in terms of the way that we’re trying to play, the way that we train them, the team selection, all of the things that come with it - ultimately, it's my responsibility.

"We've had a good week in preparation.

“The previous two or three weeks had very much been against the ball and drilling the basics of defending.

(Image: STEVE BRADING)

“We found some rhythm in the second half in the Carlisle game and wanted to try and build on that, so we spent a lot of the week focusing on work with the ball and trying to get more rhythm but we can’t put both sides of the game together, that’s the truth.

"We do well with it, we don't do very well against it; we do well against it but then we can't rhythm against it."

Cheltenham took a fifth-minute lead through Jordan Thomas but Colchester equalised in the 27th minute when Taylor finished superbly, after being sent through on goal by Samson Tovide.

But the Robins what proved to be their winner in first-half time added on when Colchester conceded possession in midfield and Thomas's deflected shot sailed past goalkeeper wrong-footed goalkeeper, Matt Macey.

READ MORE: Colchester United 1 Cheltenham Town 2 - as it happened

"We had a really positive start. a shout for a penalty and then just a really soft goal," said Cowley.

"One of the centre-halves gets dragged out into the right-back area, we don't defend it well enough, we allow the cross to come in and then we don't stop the first one at the frame of the goal and then get beat up, at the back post.

"We actually did some good things with the ball in the first half; it was our work against it that was the biggest problem because we had nowhere near enough intensity, aggression or physicality in the duels.

(Image: STEVE BRADING)

"We find a good goal but of course, we then lose Samson (Tovide), which was a huge loss to us when you already have Owura (Edwards), Anthony Scully, Teddy Bishop unavailable.

"This summer, we sold a lot of athleticism and a lot of our pace - Jayden Fevrier, Jay Mingi, Brad Ihionvien.

"You can't then on the back of that lose the likes of Samson and Owura because it hurt the team and it looked like we lost our way on the back of Samson going off the back of it.

READ MORE: Danny Cowley shares vivid childhood memories of Layer Road

"It felt like it hit our confidence but regardless of that, the second goal is such a disappointing goal to concede.

"The play builds up on our right, we allow them to come inside the pitch, Jack (Payne) has just got to keep them on the outside, we clear it, it comes inside to Lyle - who I think was the only one to come out of today with any credit - we lose it and they just walk through our midfield.

"I think one of our centre-halves comes out to try to block it but the footwork is not good enough and it gets a deflection and goes in the bottom corner and it's a really poor goal for us to concede.

"You look at their intensity to defend in the second half, the way that they threw their bodies on the line and we didn't find the same intensity."