STANLEY boss John Coleman says he’s just like a fan when he’s in the dugout and wants to see the same exciting brand of football those in the stands crave.

The Reds are on a roll again after a tricky start to the season and welcome Mansfield to the Wham Stadium tonight with the prospect of making it four successive league wins.

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Add into that run the heroic cup effort at West Ham, and there’s a real feelgood factor around the club again.

But Coleman, who will be without suspended skipper Scott Brown tonight, wants to keep that momentum going to reward the fans, especially those who have made two long trips in the last week.

He said: “You obviously want to make your home ground a fortress, but you also have to enthuse your home crowd.

“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 they’re 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.”

He added: “I’ve got to thank the fans who came to Colchester. 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.

“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 manager felt his side were below-par for the first 45 minutes in Essex, but is pleased about his improving defence.

“I thought we were ordinary in the first half on Saturday,” he said. “But we’re starting to defend better and that’s good because defending cost us games earlier in the season.”