Tom Eastman admits Colchester United have under-achieved as a team in League Two, this season.

John McGreal’s side are unlikely to make the play-offs and lie four points off the top seven in 11th spot, with four games remaining.

Colchester have dropped points at home this season against all but two of the sides currently residing in the bottom 11 places.

And long-serving defender Eastman concedes that is one of the reasons why they are not as high as he believes they should be, heading into the final run-in.

Eastman said: “We know we’re a good side and we’re definitely a few points short of where we should be, this season when you look at the squad and some of the games that we’ve lost at home against the likes of Yeovil and Barnet.

“We’re a good team with good players and that’s shown, because we’ve shown that when we’ve beaten teams at the top of the table.

“With the team we’ve got, we should be in and around the play-offs.”

Colchester host fifth-placed Notts County at the Weston Homes Community Stadium on Saturday and follow that up with matches against Lincoln City and Swindon Town, before a trip to Exeter City on the final day of the campaign.

“We’ve got a tough run-in and all of our games now are against teams who are chasing promotion,” said Colchester-born Eastman, who has made more than 250 league appearances for the U’s since joining them from Ipswich Town in 2011.

“It’s going to be good fun for us to test ourselves against them and none of the boys are going to take their foot off the pedal.

“We’ve got four games to go and we’ll be looking to win all of them.

“We’re definitely not going to make it easy for anyone who plays against us.

“We have Notts County here on Saturday and hopefully get the three points.”

Colchester will be looking to get back to winning ways this weekend, after seeing their four-match unbeaten run ended by league leaders Accrington Stanley last Saturday.

Accrington are now just one win away from clinching promotion to League One and Eastman says they should try and emulate John Coleman’s side’s success.

“Full credit to Accrington – they were good on the opening day of the season against us and they’re still good now,” added the 26-year-old defender.

“It looks like they’re going up so good luck to them but hopefully we can kick on next season and look to do what they’ve done.”