Colchester boss Tony Humes turns to sports psychologist

Colchester manager Tony Humes hopes a sports psychologist can help kick-start his team's campaign.

The U's crashed out of the Johnstone's Paint Trophy to Northampton on Tuesday night, after which Humes labelled the players as "soft" following a winless run of seven matches so far.

However, Humes, whose team avoided relegation on the final day last term, believes a change in mentality could produce the required results.

"It is the individual mindset of player. We have a sports psycologist that the players are dealing with. It started at the end of last season and we know what happened, we got out of it," said Humes, quoted in the Colchester Gazette.

"We had all talked about being mentally stronger for what the players went through last season, but we are still waiting for that to happen (this season) and that is the disappointing thing."

Colchester do not have a Sky Bet League One match until after the international break when they travel to Chesterfield.