Bolton boss Ian Evatt felt his side produced their best performance of the season so far at Colchester – despite their 2-0 defeat.

Goals from Tom Eastman and Jevani Brown inflicted a fourth straight loss in all competitions for the Trotters.

But Evatt said: “I think there was a massive improvement from last week, definitely – I think everyone could see that.

“If we can play more like that for 44 more games and be more ruthless, then we’ll win a lot more than we lose.

“That’s the first time that I’ve really thought ‘this looks more like my team’.

“We need to keep improving week on week but it’s early in the season and you don’t win trophies, championships and promotions this early in the season.

“That’s the best we’ve played, with the pace and the speed and I feel like we’ve been mugged a bit, to be honest.

“They scored just before half-time with a set-piece and that sapped a bit of energy from us.

“In the second half, we came out and we dominated the ball again.

“I’d like to see the possession stats but Colchester at this level are a very good team.”

Ali Crawford’s low shot had rattled a post for Bolton before Colchester went ahead in the 44th minute when Eastman headed in unmarked after Brown had flicked on Cohen Bramall’s corner.

Bolton started the second half well and Nathan Delfouneso curled a shot just wide while Eoin Doyle fired straight at Dean Gerken.

But the Us clinched victory with 19 minutes remaining through Brown, who calmly lifted the ball past Billy Crellin and in from the edge of the area after being picked out by Miles Welch-Hayes’ fine through pass.

Colchester head coach Steve Ball said: “I was so happy with the all-round performance.

“I want to talk a little about us out of possession. There’s been lots spoken about us when we’re in possession, which has been great, but that’s two clean sheets on the bounce for us now.

“I’ve just said to the players that hopefully we can have a really good season this year and it’s all going to be geared around being solid out of possession.

“We know that if we can get that bit right, we’ll get the other bit right too.

“It was a really important clean sheet against a very good team.

“We knew we’d be facing a very good side – we saw that in the prep.

“The staff have done a very good job this week highlighting Bolton’s really good players.

“Nathan Delfouneso is a top player at this level and we had to stop them – that was the key because they have threats all over the pitch.”