1985–86 Colchester United F.C. season
season of football team
The 1985–86 season was Colchester United's 44th season in their history and fifth consecutive season in fourth tier of English football, the Fourth Division. Alongside competing in the Fourth Division, the club also participated in the FA Cup, the League Cup and the Associate Members' Cup.
Colchester finished sixth in the league table come the end of the season, but were nine points distant of promoted Port Vale in fourth place. The U's were knocked out of the FA Cup by non-League opposition in Wycombe Wanderers in the first round, and exited the League Cup in the first round to Millwall. Despite a win against Southend United in the Associate Members' Cup, Colchester were defeated by Northampton Town who progressed from the group stages to the knockout phase of the competition.
Three weeks prior to the end of the season, manager Cyril Lea was sacked and replaced by former U's goalkeeper Mike Walker.
Season overview
Following regulation changes in the wake of the Heysel Stadium disaster and the Bradford City stadium fire, Layer Road was facing £500,000 of safety improvements to bring the ground up to standards. With the club ailing financially, sections of the ground were closed, reducing capacity to 4,900.
Manager Cyril Lea continued a trend of recruiting former Ipswich Town by bringing in forwards Robin Turner and Trevor Whymark during the season.
In October, the club were top of the table, but after suffering six successive league defeats, four without scoring, the club slid down the table and crashed out of the FA Cup to non-League Wycombe Wanderers.
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