Parkinson Post Colchester

Charlton's hopes of automatic promotion might not be as strong as some others but we kept up our chances of this with a 1-0 win over Colchester United on Tuesday.

Nicky Forster's first half goal was enough to secure as a hard fought win and Phil Parkinson knows it was a tough game, Parkinson told The Official Website: "It was a tough old game. We expected it to be that way. Colchester had a good win on Saturday and came here with renewed confidence. At times it was an ugly type of game, but you've got to come out on top in those games and from our point of view, it was a performance full of character, spirit and heart.

"From the 11 players, plus the subs, I thought everyone played their part. At times with those long throws coming in the box it's difficult, and you've got to keep concentrating and putting your body on the line to protect your goal and we did that.

"We said beforehand that tonight will be about competing with Colchester and coming out on top of what they're about. Can we then get the ball down and play and do what we can do? Now obviously, with the pressure they put on us, we didn't get it down and pass it like we can do, but I think that was credit to Colchester."

The victory took us up to fourth, ahead of Swindon Town who dropped more points on Monday night and leaves us 3 points behind Leeds United who recaptured second spot after a win at Carlisle United with Millwall only managing a 1-1 draw at Yeovil Town.

Securing a play-off spot at least is Parkinson's first aim but The Addicks boss still knows we're also in with a shout of automatic promotion too, which is something that he feared had passed following the 4-0 defeat against Millwall yet we've worked hard to overcome that setback, Parkinson added: "We're nine points clear of seventh place, but we need another to win that make that play-off place mathematically certain.

"But obviously we've got our eye on the top two and we'll keep fighting for that place.

"After the Millwall game [the 4-0 defeat] we were disappointed and we spoke about it and worked hard on the training pitch to be more solid as a team. We've certainly shown that with the recent team sheets."

Norwich City were beaten again so if we can beat them on Saturday we'll not only be right in the hunt for second spot the race to be crowned League 1 champions is blown wide open again, and we couldn't be counted out of that either really!

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