City will look upon this as two points lost as they faltered in their bid to climb out of mid-table with a 0-0 home draw against Colchester United.
After running the first half, they saw Colchester open up their game and come right back into it in the second half.
The big question hovering over the match was whether Colchester would have suffered from their Carling Cup exploits at Southampton in the week.
From the start City set out to find any chinks in their fitness but found there were none as they came up against an impressive back four led by Wayne Brown with strong support from Pat Baldwin.
There were some early long attempts by City's Australian Luke Wilkshire which kept Dean Gerken on his toes but City quickly decided they would have to be patient.
They spent the first period knocking the ball around confidently in front of defenders but getting nowhere.
On the one occasion Gerken was in trouble he missed a 30-yard shot from Tony Dinning but managed to parry it with his knees.
Dinning unwanted by Wigan and looking for a contract at Ashton Gate began a month's loan with a tidy game in midfield until tiring in the second half.
Apart from his testing shot, as Wilkshire played a short ball into his stride, Dinning made an important stop on the edge of City's box to end the dangerous run by Neil Danns.
Before the break Colchester were reluctant to push up to support Craig Fagan and were not helped by a clash of heads which saw young Greg Halford twice have to go off to have an injury treated.
The only danger they threatened came from a free-kick after Fagan had been toppled by Tony Butler.
Brown's well struck left-foot kick was homing in on the bottom left-hand corner but Steve Phillips, sensing the danger got down well as the pace picked up in the second half, Phillips had more to do and saved well from Sam Stockley and Fagan.
Bristol threw on extra attackers near the end but the final whistle came with Fagan lifting the ball just over the bar as the offside flag went up.