Colchester United host Hartlepool United this afternoon, hoping to finish the season with a swagger.

The U’s currently sit tenth in League One and are three points ahead of their visitors, in the table.

Colchester have lost only one of their last 11 games but are without a win in their last seven fixtures.

U’s boss John Ward said: “We want to try hard to complete our season as strongly as we can.

“Outside of the top six, there’s only Stevenage who have lost fewer games than us.

“We’ve been hard to beat and we’re trying to make the extra step between being a team that’s hard to beat to trying to win the odd-goal games.

“We haven’t quite done that over the last month, because we’ve played a lot of top-six teams.

“We wanted to turn a few draws into wins to give us a chance of getting closer to the top-six but it hasn’t happened.

“We have a big six games to come and we want to do as well as we can and finish as high as we can.”

Tom Eastman and Steven Gillespie are both pushing for recalls against Hartlepool, having been rested at Exeter City, last weekend.

Meanwhile, Ward has praised the U’s committed supporters who have travelled many miles to follow their team over recent weeks.

Colchester played nine games last month, including trips to Exeter City, Walsall and Wycombe Wanderers.

“The last few weeks have been a drain on the supporters’ resources and time,” added Ward.

“But they’ve been there and apart from the Walsall game, we’ve certainly given them a lot of encouragement with our performances and approach.

“I hope they’ve felt relatively well rewarded and we have certainly appreciated their appearances and their time.

“We certainly recognise what it’s cost them.”

See the Gazette and follow our U’s reporter Jonathan Waldron on Twitter @JonWaldron1 for all of the latest Colchester United news.