[themaclad]

OXFORD U
KASSAM STADIUM 31/8/2024 15.00HRS

THE BAXI DERBY


OXFORD UNITED

Oxford United Football Club (/ˈɒksfərd/) is a professional football club based in Oxford, England. The club compete in the EFL Championship, the second tier of English football, after achieving promotion in the 2024 EFL League One play-off final. Founded as Headington Football Club in 1893, the club adopted its current name in 1960. Nicknamed The U's, it has played its home games at the Kassam Stadium, replacing its former home of Manor Ground in 2001.

The club joined the Football League in 1962 after winning the Southern Football League, reaching the Second Division in 1968.[2] After relegation in 1976, between 1984 and 1986 the club earned successive promotions into the First Division, and won the League Cup in 1986.[3] However, Oxford were unable thereby to enter the 1987 UEFA Cup because of the UEFA ban on English clubs in European competitions.[4] Relegation from the top flight in 1988 began an 18-year decline which saw the club relegated to the Conference in 2006, becoming the first winners of a major trophy to be relegated from the Football League. After four seasons, Oxford returned to League Two in 2010 via the play-offs, and six seasons later achieved promotion to League One, after finishing second in League Two in 2016. In 2024 they were promoted to the EFL Championship via the play-offs.[5]


THE CAR PARK KASSAM STADIUM

The Kassam Stadium (also known as Grenoble Road) is the home of Oxford United F.C., and is named after the ground's owner and former chairman of the football club, Firoz Kassam.

The Kassam Stadium was built whilst Oxford United played in Division Two (third tier); however, Oxford were relegated to Division Three (fourth tier) the season before the new stadium was built and were further relegated to the Conference National (fifth tier) in 2005–06. The club was previously based at The Manor Ground from 1925 until the opening of the Kassam Stadium in 2001. Following Oxford's promotion from League One at the end of the 2023–24 season, the stadium will host Championship (second-tier) games for the first time in its history.

https://www.oufc.co.uk/

MANAGER



Des Buckingham (born 7 February 1985) is an English professional football manager who is the head coach of EFL Championship club Oxford United.

Buckingham became the youngest head coach in the history of the A-League during the 2016–17 A-League season.[1]

HOT SHOTS



INS AND OUTS



PREVIOUS



Sad anorak fact the 4-0 win was the only game played that night and was given full match commentary on Radio 5

Other games



League table



Murders every week

Inspector Morse is a British detective drama television series based on a series of novels by Colin Dexter. It starred John Thaw as Detective Chief Inspector Morse and Kevin Whately as Sergeant Lewis. The series comprises 33 two-hour episodes (100 minutes excluding commercials) produced between 6 January 1987 and 15 November 2000. Dexter made uncredited cameo appearances in all but three of the episodes.



The View

What a difference the last week has been, positivity back in the club eagerly awaiting being drawn against some club miles from Preston in the next round of the Fizzy Drink thing, weather's getting warmer again and a second new ground in a week.
This is only the third league meeting since 1984

[themaclad]

The Fitness Test

Having made his first appearance since April during the week – and his 100th for North End – midfielder Ali McCann will once again be in contention on Saturday.

Robbie Brady, who has missed the last two matches, returned to training on Thursday and may be available for selection in Oxford.

Six players came in to the side for the 5-0 victory over Harrogate Town and they’ll hope to be involved again this weekend, especially Milutin Osmajić following his three-goal haul.

The U’s

Oxford United returned to the Championship for the first time in 25 years in the summer, coming out 2-0 winners over Bolton Wanderers in the League One Play-Off final.

They started their league campaign with an impressive victory over Norwich City on home turf, however defeats against Coventry City and Blackburn Rovers have followed.

Des Buckingham has been busy recruiting for second-tier football and brought in Siriki Dembélé from Birmingham City on Thursday.


The Officials

Referee: Keith Stroud
Assistant Referees: Shaun Hudson and Richard Woodward
Fourth Official: Thomas Parsons

Experienced EFL official Keith Stroud will take charge of this fixture.

It’ll be the first PNE game he’s refereed since October 2022, when North End were beaten by Bristol City at Ashton Gate.

So far this season, Stroud has shown 12 yellow cards in four matches.

[themaclad]

Oxford United 3 Harris Goodrham Leigh Preston North End 1 Riis

Oxford United line-up: Cumming; Kioso, Long, Brown, Bennett (Leigh, 45); McEachran (El Mizouni, 77); Phillips (Dembélé, 35), Rodrigues (Vaulks, 77), Brannagan, Goodrham; Harris. Subs not used: Ingham, Ebiowei, Sibley, Dale, Scarlett.

PNE line-up: Woodman; Storey, Lindsay, Hughes; Potts, Thórdarson (McCann, 72), Whiteman, Kesler-Hayden (Brady, 58); Greenwood (Holmes, 72), Keane (Okkels, 80); Riis (Osmajić, 72). Subs not used: Cornell, Whatmough, Frøkjær, Ledson.

Attendance: 11,403 (1,467 PNE fans).

Referee: Mr K Stroud.

All started so well, but ending in that losing feeling personally blame ITV4 think it was their main match.

A truly odd ground cannot fathom why they only built three stands and put a car park at the unbuilt end. No dreaming Spires for us, the ground is about 4 miles from the City almost adjacent to the Littlemore mental instution.
One change for us Greenwood for Mads.
Started really well ahead after 3 minutes Riis from close range thoroughly dominated the first 20 minutes could have had other goals didn't take them and then came Freddie's error.
Recycled ball into the box Woodman comes for it changes his mind and is in no mans land as Harri's header floats gently over him into the back of the net. Apart from a very brief bit of pressure at the start of the second period that was it.
The goal gave them confidence and began to attack our oh so flimsy midfield, Whiteman spent most of the time playing England type football backward , sideways abnd Thordason had a frustrating afternoon.
First half level at the break which was probably right, although Mr Stroud was starting to annoy the away support by penalising us for evrything and giving nothing against the home side.
Early second half chance to KKH well saved by the keeper, but then from what looked like a foul to us not given Goodrham ball on the right curled it passed Woodman from about 20 yards.
The fould count started to rise against us another one missed by Mr Stroud led to Lindsay getting his second yellow down to ten and within a minute 3-1 down Leigh heading in at the back post. Forced some pressure in the latter stages but any hope of getting anything from this had long since gone

HECKY THUMPED VIEW

It was a case of one that got away at Oxford United in the mind of Paul Heckingbottom, as his PNE side were beaten 3-1.

North End started right on the front foot and opened the scoring in the third minute, and went on to create a whole host of chances in the first quarter of an hour.

The game turned when Mark Harris drew level for the hosts, though, and they then scored twice more in the second half, before playing the last 20 minutes against ten men after Liam Lindsay saw red.

Hecky said: “Frustrated’s the word. It’s definitely one that’s got away. To come away from home and start the way we did and be as dominant as I thought we were with the ball and without the ball, we scored and deserved to score.

“We couldn’t go and get that second when I thought we were on top. That’s the nature of the game, you have to then be really strong at the other side. I think they only got in our box a couple of times in the first half and the first poor bit of play from us and the ball’s in the back of our net at 1-1.

“It was frustrating at half-time to go in at 1-1. In the second half we wanted to start with the same sort of aggression without the ball which caused them problems, and we did.

“We weren’t as good with the ball in the second half, but then we concede another poor goal. I know Oxford will be really delighted with the finish. It’s a fantastic finish from 25 yards. He probably won’t hit another one like that again this season, but we should be dealing with that. He should have been kept wide and never cut in to have a shot at goal.

“All of a sudden we’re 2-1 down in a game that I feel like we should be winning. When we’re trying to make the changes, we get the sending off just before the changes which is frustrating because I disagree with that decision as well. Then the game had sort of got away from us, but the ten men stuck at it to be fair.”

North End now have a two-week international break, which will give Paul Heckingbottom – only in the job for just over a week – valuable time on the training pitch.


The gaffer’s been very honest about appreciating it’s not going to be an overnight fix, but there’s work which he feels he can get into the players, which will benefit them for the remainder of the season and moving forwards.

Asked how his first week on the job has been, Hecky said: “Overall I’m really pleased. I’m delighted to be here and delighted to be on the sideline.

“I’m pleased with lots of things I’ve seen but I’m also under no illusions that it’s a big job. We’ve got a lot that we want to do and I want everyone to enjoy trying to do it.

“It’s about embracing what we want to do, embracing the hard work and the challenge of it because it’s a tough, tough league, and we won’t be given anything. We’ve got to go on and earn that result.”


Oxford United boss Des Buckingham told BBC Radio Oxford:

“I was right behind Tyler Goodrham’s strike – and it was a wonderful finish. Seeing him cutting in on the right-hand side, it’s normally him doing that on the opposite side and curling it in with his right foot.

“That’s the reason we signed Tyler to a long-term contract at this club. He’s thriving at the moment in the Championship and long may that continue.

“It’s difficult when the opposition have a new manager in to plan what they might do, and they set up differently to what we thought they would. It took us a little while to get to grips with that. But we managed to get the message on and made some changes which balanced it up and got us back into the game.

“It’s a great start for us in this league. We were coming into the unknown, so to get six points from the first 12 – if you’d offered that to us before the season started with the amount of unknowns and the changes we’ve had in our squad we’d certainly have taken that.”