Oxford United were unlucky to lose out to a Manchester United reserve team on Tuesday night.

U’s started slowly, but dominated the second half. Man Utd had an early chance to take the lead, but Eikram’s penalty was saved by Ryan Clarke. They did take the lead just before half-time, Eikram slotting a free-kick under the jumping wall past Clarke. Within a minute U’s were level. U’s broke straight forward and Hall crossed for Beano to finish. 1-1 at half-time.

United played some excellent football in the second half, over-running the MU kids. Only some slightly slack finishing, and help from the officials stopped Oxford from putting them to the sword. Blatantly incorrect offsides were given, a cast-iron penalty was denied, free-kicks were given to MU defenders for little reason. It was sods law then that Man Utd grabbed a late winner. A soft free-kick was awarded, when the ball was crossed in the linesman raised his flag, but then lowered it again as Ajose fired home.

Good performance from Oxford though.

Some photos here.

Oxford United are back in the Football League after beating York City 3-1 in the play-off final at Wembley.

There , will be much written about the game, and I will mostly leave the words to others. Suffice to say that goals from Matt Green, James Constable and Alfie Potter, all with great finishes, sent the U’s travelling masses into rapture.

It is a great achievement for the club, in arguably the most important match in the club’s history. To be back in the league is vitally important in every way. MFW wants to thank everyone involved for an amazing day (including the group of York fans we met in London after who were great sports, very gracious, and a credit to their club).

Over the next few posts I will put up some of the  pictures taken during the day…

Oxford United are 0ff to Wembley after a fine 2-0 win over Rushden & Diamonds at the KasStad today. Second half goals from Matt Green & James Constable gave U’s the win, and a 3-1 victory on aggregate. United go on to play York City at Wembley for a place in the Football League next season.

Click the thumbnail for a bigger version…

Oxford United overcame a stubborn Altrincham side to win 1-0 yesterday. Beano scored after Creighton flicked on a Chappers corner. Not only back to back wins, but the first set piece goal in recent memory.
United now go in to a run of three home games in 7 days, plus a final day seaside trip to the seaside, as Wilder’s boys look to haul themselves back into form in time for the play-offs.

Oxford United went to Hayes & Yeading yesterday, and lost 1-2 to cast serious doubt on the end of season run in for U’s. A goal from James Constable just before half-time gave U’s the lead, but two second half goals from Marwa sent U’s fans into despair…well that, the performance and the ref.  U’s lost Matt Green to a two yellow card sending off after less than 20 minutes, then Simon Clist to a first half head wound.

The only good thing about the day was the curry in Southall, and taking the piss out of Hayes winger Binns. Shame about the football.

Oxford United were reliant on an injury time winner from Matt Green to overcome a stubborn, but poor Gateshead side at the KasStad today.

Chris Wilder brought Adam Chapman, Lewis Chalmers, Jamie Cook and Sam Deering into the starting line-up. Alfie Potter returned from injury to the bench.

United started brightly, but Gateshead harried and chased, and wore U’s down. Little of note came from either side.

U’s went ahead 7 minutes into the second half. A long throw from Chalmers was knocked down by Day, Beano was on hand to stab home from 6 yards. The lead lasted just 4 minutes however as Gateshead struck back with a controversial equaliser. From a free-kick on the left, Swailes header was cleared off the line by the excellent Wright. The ball ran to Armstrong whose shot arrowed into the net from the edge of the area. The linesman immediately flagged for offside, Clare adjudged to be interfering with play in front of Clarke. The Gateshead players argued, the ref consulted the linesman, and overruled him, allowing the goal.

Aggrieved by the manner of the goal, U’s charged forward and forced a number of corners, but created few clear-cut chances. Pushing forward, U’s left gaps at the back, and should have been punished when the diving Armstrong broke clear, but drove wide.

U’s brought on Potter, Green and Grant as they looked to grab the vital winning goal. But all was looking grim until injury time. Clist put in a free-kick, Beano and Grant helped the ball on, and Matt Green was in the right place to finish. As unlikely a winner as the York game on the opening day of the season, but all that will be remembered at the end of the season will be the 3 points.

Now onto the biggest game of U’s season, Stevenage at the LameX Stadium on Tuesday.

Match gallery below, click on thumbnail for bigger version.

Just a quick post with some thoughts last night’s game against AFC Wimbledon.

I won’t really go into match reporting, I can just leave that to the Wimbledon website, whose great report can be found here. Not much you can add to that. MFW’s match gallery is here. The BBC highlights are here.

What I will say is that was one of the best Oxford United performances in ages. Right from the start U’s were out of the blocks and attacking Wimbledon. For the first 20-25 minutes U’s battered them, with Little Sammy Deering at the heart of most things. Scoring was important, Beano scoring was too, and on 14 minutes we got both. Wimbledon came back into things as the half went on, but were mainly kept to wild long shots.

The second half was about as one sided affair as I’ve seen against a team quite as decent as Wimbledon. Even before the sending off the Wombles had little of the play – indeed sub keeper Turley apparently only touched the ball 6 times. The defence were solid, the midfield bossed the game – Hargreavsio was immense, and the forwards stretched their defence. The only thing missing was more goals than just the second for Beano late on.

Great game, great result, 6 points clear. Now possibly (though hopefully not) onto Chester on Saturday, and Cambridge on Tuesday. Decision about expelling Chester will be made on Friday, hopefully in time for U’s to leave in good time. Even if Chester aren’t expelled though, it must be considered unlikely the game will go ahead – players, police and others still being unpaid.

Oxford United beat AFC  Wimbledon 2-0 at the KasStad tonight to move 6 points clear at the top of the Blue Square Premier.

United played some great football, entirely bossing the second half. A goal in each half from James Constable gave U’s the win, but United dominated much of the match (as the stats testify).

Beano Celebrates His Second Goal

More thoughts, and a photo gallery later on…..

]]> http://mincheryfarmweb.co.uk/oufc/2010/02/23/a-stroll-on-the-common/feed/ 0 http://mincheryfarmweb.co.uk/oufc/2010/02/17/rushden-pay-the-penalty/ http://mincheryfarmweb.co.uk/oufc/2010/02/17/rushden-pay-the-penalty/#comments Wed, 17 Feb 2010 21:18:25 +0000 mfwadmin http://mincheryfarmweb.co.uk/oufc/?p=147

Oxford United beat Rushden & Diamonds 1-0 last night to move three points clear at the top of the Blue Square Premier.

Beano came back after suspension, as did Rushden star Lee Tomlin. Alfie Potter was the U’s to miss out with a hamstring injury.

The match can be summed up in five parts:

1. Average Oxford. United were at well under 100% in most areas of the pitch. Too many passes went astray, too many opportunities were gifted to Rushden, especially yet another woeful Rhys Day back header. Too little cohesion in the play all over the park. Beano missing another penalty summed it up nicely.
2. Awful Rushden finishing. Even when gifted opportunities they never really stretched Clarke. It also mostly came from our cock-ups, their creativity wasn’t great.
3. Awful pitch. Has it ever been worse since we moved ground? Not really helping the footy, of either team in this case.
4. Cynical Rushden. Rarely has a team not managed by Steve Evans wasted time so much. Every time the keeper got the ball, every throw in, every free-kick, every random player sitting down but not apparently needing the physio; right from the first whistle through to the point that the ball hit the back of their net. My personal favourite was their keeper running over to the corner flag for no apparent reason (confused as to where the ball was?!) when the ball was back by the goal at a goal-kick (he did also manage to run half way up the pitch to delay the penalty). When will we ever get a ref that books as many as he should for that?
5. Two penalties. The first I couldn’t see from the far end, but the tv highlights (http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_conf/8520450.stm) show a pretty clear foul on Wright by Louis. Beano did his best Jonny Wilkinson impression to foil a half-time lead.
   The second seemed harsh at the time, and probably harsh on review. But the defender did have both arms around Green and was easily led into pulling him down. Adam Chapman showing great bottle, stepped up, ignored the gamesmanship, and blasted the ball down the middle for the winner.

Adam Chapman Blasts Home The Winner

So, we didn’t play great, we rode some luck, but we still won. Three points clear, with game in hand is a good position – playing a bit better would be nice though.

Common consensus on Saturday was that Beano was going to be suspended for two matches after picking up his 10th booking of the season.
Checking The FA’s disciplinary website (link) it appears not. Now this could just be a processing delay, the ref’s report could be delayed. But if we’ve had the numbers wrong (and it is a fair few bookings to lose track of), we get the bonus of Beano for the Luton game tomorrow.

UPDATE:   Looks like the FA have caught up, and yes he is suspended for 2 games.