Wivenhoe travelled to neighbours Colchester Villa looking for their first league result in 2014. Despite a disappointing performance last week against fellow strugglers FC Clacton, a positive training session on Saturday provided a good feeling that we could get something out of today's game against Colchester Villa who find themselves sitting pretty at the top of the A league.

With Luke Pickersgill missing after picking up an injury in last weeks game, Wivenhoe reverted to a 3-5-2 formation with regular full backs Brandon Snook and Lewis Callander operating at centre half alongside Callum Knevett. Callum Wilkinson made his first start for the team since joining from Lexden Saints.

The game started at a high tempo, with both teams matching one another physically and technically. However, Villa provided much more of an attacking threat and after a couple of close attempts, Wivenhoe goalkeeper Oliver Smith was called upon to make a point blank save at the far post as a deep cross found its way to the Villa forward who was all alone at the back post. Despite Wivenhoe's hard work, Colchester Villa took the lead when an almost identical deep cross found its way to the back post, however, this time the Villa forward made no mistake and tucked the ball away into the corner of the net.

Wivenhoe continued to knock and on 25 minutes were denied a stonewall penalty following a clear push in the penalty box, instead the opposition took the ball, moved upfield and finished themselves to make the score 2-0. Despite the setback, it was good to see that heads did not drop and within 5 minutes, Wivenhoe pulled a goal back when some good work from Michael Osborne drew a foul from the Villa defender inside the penalty box, this time the referee did point to the spot (despite this one looking less like a penalty than the previous appeal) leaving Charlie Rose to coolly convert the spot kick.

Despite being 2-1 down at half time, there was a strong belief that we could still come away with all 3 points.

The second half was played in a similar fashion to the first, with both teams battling hard and trying to get on top. Wivenhoe struggled to carve out any real clear cut opportunities in the second half and as a result, the Villa goalkeeper had a relatively untroubled afternoon. Legs began to tire and the game became more stretched as Wivenhoe went in search of the equaliser and as a result, Colchester Villa capitalised and scored 2 more goals. The first coming through a decent strike from outside the box and the fourth and final goal found it's way into the back of the net when Wivenhoe allowed the ball to bounce inside the penalty box and the Villa forward powered through the defence to finish from point blank range.

The 2 late goals to make the scoreline 4-1 probably flattered Villa a little in what was a tight match, with the only real difference between the sides being the pace and power Colchester offered in forward areas. Having said that, at the end of the day, games are won based on what a team offers in their forward areas so in that respect Colchester Villa were every bit deserving of their 4-1 victory.

Myself and Danny believe that things were a lot more positive than the 4-1 scoreline suggests. On the whole, we are defending well and on the occasions when we do slip up, Oliver Smith is often on hand to keep the opposition at bay. Charlie Rose, Dylan Beaird and Brandon Lam have the makings of as good a midfield trio as you will see at this age level. We are confident that with a little bit more quality in the final third, results will soon turn around and that first win of 2014 is not too far away!

Final Score: Colchester Villa 4-1 Wivenhoe Town (Ch. Rose 30')

Hopefully we can keep up our good cup form next Sunday when we host our rivals Wivenhoe Youth in the Open Cup Quarter Final.

Wivenhoe Town: 1) Oliver Smith 2) Brandon Snook (c) 3) Lewis Callander 6) Dylan Beaird 7) Callum Rose 8) Charlie Rose 9) Callum Wilkinson 11) Michael Osborne 12) Kieran Cook 16) Brandon Lam 17) Callum Knevett

Used Substitute: 18) Macauley Ayton