John Coleman wants to reward the Stanley fans who made two long trips last week with maximum points against Mansfield tomorrow night.
Hundreds of supporters made the trip to the London Stadium for Wednesday's cup tie with West Ham before 93 away fans went to the Weston Homes Community Stadium at the weekend.
Now the manager is keen for the players to repay the faith that has been shown in them from the stands.
“I've got to thank the fans who came to Colchester,” he said. “It's a long way and I know most of them will have been to West Ham too just a few days earlier. It's a lot of money, a lot of time and a lot of effort and they should be applauded and rewarded for that.
“It makes it all the sweeter when you can send them on that five hour trip home with three points in the bag but we have to keep going and reward them at home too. We have to excite them.
“To be honest I want to be excited when I'm on the bench. I want us to be playing edge of the seat football and attack and have shots and go past people and get crosses in. In that respect I'm just a fan as well.”
The Reds are looking for a fourth consecutive league win when they take on the Stags and Coley thinks that improving performances and results at the Wham Stadium remains key.
“You obviously want to make your home ground a fortress but you also have to enthuse your home crowd,” he explained. “You've got to get them so that they play a part in it and the only way to do that is to excite them, play on the front foot and have the ball in the other team's last third.
“It becomes a chicken and egg situation; you need the crowd to help up your game but you have to up your game to get the crowd going. It's difficult but certainly doable and it's something we've done in the past so I think we can do it again.
“When you have the numbers that we have as opposed to 20 or 30 thousand it's crucial that they're onside and behind you and making it intimidating for the opposition straight away. To be fair our fans are good in that respect, they don't get on players' backs and they don't moan and groan too much.
“We're not getting carried away and we all know we need to improve. We're starting to defend better and that's good because defending cost us games earlier in the season. We need to keep that up.”