A Point at Oxford
I said in my last report that I’m not personally interested in anything the Manager of our previous opponents – Ian Evatt – has to say about anything. But I’m sure – thanks to social media – that few of us have missed his statement about Morecambe’s support after the game at the University of Bolton Stadium last Tuesday. He said:
“They don’t bring many fans.”
Really? I was there and there seemed to be quite a lot of us to me.
This made me wonder how many supporters previous visitors had brought to the venue so far this season.
The Trotters’ first home game against Wycombe saw 416 fans in the away end. The second – near neighbours Salford City – brought 781. The third club to visit Horwich were ourselves.
How many did we bring?
120? 230? 300? Any other offers?
Oh – it was 764; just seventeen fewer than a club which is only seventeen miles away brought the previous week.
So I’d just like to clarify Mr Evatt’s reasoning for anyone else who was initially confused by this comment and mistook it – as I did – as a spiteful and rather childish remark made by a very dislikeable individual with an extremely low IQ.
I now realise the error of this view and I would like to put on record my own personal thanks to Big Ian for making this brilliant observation and thus challenging at least my own prejudices about him.
What I failed to understand is that if you subtract the number of racists Mr Evatt has identified among the travelling Shrimps’ support from the total and then discount them altogether, he’s almost right. As always. Because that means that we didn’t take `many’ – as he so generously suggested – we didn’t take any at all, did we?
Thanks for that, Ian: you truly are a very fair-minded gentleman who is simply widely misunderstood by people with a far lower intellect.
Anyway, moving on…
Morecambe travelled to Oxford today to face a team which, like themselves, has experienced a stuttering start to their League One campaign. United won their first game of the season but have lost their last two, most recently at home to Lincoln City last Tuesday night by the odd goal in three. They were in nineteenth position in the table as a result.
Manager Karl Robinson reflected on the result – and what could be a serious injury to star player Marcus Browne – when he told local Oxford Media earlier this week:
“When you have people around you who you believe in and want to work with then you just stay positive and keep believing in what you are doing. I have had some lovely messages from fans since Tuesday, and I have had some terrible ones too! I respect all those views; I one hundred percent respect everyone’s view. The table doesn’t look how we want it to and I had two hours sleep on Tuesday. The result and then Marcus’s injury made me very upset and I struggled with that. But then we came in on Wednesday and talked as a group about what we need to do to put it right. Then today and Friday we will put that into action and then on Saturday we will go out there and try to get the win for ourselves and for the fans. We have a very good squad and because we have lost a little bit of that group we just have to find a different way. That’s an exciting challenge. Morecambe will come and work their socks off and we will respect them as we do every team. They are a good club, well managed and they will make it hard for us. But we accept that challenge and we will rise to it and do all we can to get the win this weekend.”
Morecambe, meanwhile, were in an even more parlous position than the ‘U’s’ prior to kick-off: twenty-second and thus in the relegation places.
I mistakenly suggested that Max Melbourne was injured by a Bolton player last Tuesday in Horwich. I must withdraw this slur: it turns out that Max’s hamstring had gone. So good luck to him in his recovery: he clearly wasn’t available for selection today. Meanwhile, Cole Stockton – who hasn’t featured in the Shrimps’ squad recently – has handed in a transfer request. Today, he was named on the bench as Jake Taylor took the place of our injured full-back.
In previous encounters, United have had the better of the Shrimps with six wins out of fifteen and only three losses. Last season, Oxford beat Morecambe 3-1 at this venue but lost 2-1 in the reverse fixture.
On Wednesday, King Derek told Morecambe media guru Matt Smith the following:
“I think we’ve acquitted ourselves well. We are also a new team. New faces have come in. That final pass at this moment in time is letting us down. I think you’ve always got to base yourself on having a good defensive unit. That allows you the platform to move forward. Finding that right pass has been a little bit of an issue. But that will come with the understanding (between) the new players coming in and the ones already here. I think that we are moving ahead as a team. We’ve got a small squad – everyone understands that. We’ve been able to take in players who are good on the ball and good defensively as well. I can think they will progress over the season. It’s our job again this year to have League One football the season after.”
As far as Oxford are concerned, he said:
“They are good on the ball; they are good defensively. Oxford are a very good side. They’ve got a lot of quality players. They do well with loans in that London area because of their proximity to it. They have a vast array of quality players that they can take from. We’ve been the underdogs for so many years. That’s not going to change in the short term but over the long term, that will hopefully be ever-changing. They will be looking to get a positive result. We are exactly the same. We’ll go there and try and get the better of them. We did it here at the end of last season. It was a fantastic game and it was a much-needed three points at the time. We’ve got a tight-knit squad. They’ve got a good bond. They react well to each other. They look after each other. That is very important. Having that team spirit takes you far.”
The weather was dry, sunny and warm – as opposed to hot – as the game kicked-off.
Oxford asked all the early questions, winning a free-kick and then a corner in the first couple of minutes. James Henry took a shot from distance which only just missed the target with just two minutes on the clock. In United’s strangely-designed stadium, the ball was last seen heading towards the car part exit on the open side of the ground. Then Jacob Bedeau made an important block as Oxford danger man Billy Bodin took aim after three minutes. There was a blow for the visitors when Ash Hunter limped off with only six minutes played. The `U’s’ then passed the ball around accurately enough for a while but they didn’t make much progress as far as breaching the visiting defence was concerned. Liam Gibson took advantage of a slip and played-in Jensen Weir with a quarter of an hour played but the chance came to nothing. Then Gibson fluffed his lines after 17 minutes as an under-pressure Jake Taylor played a superb cross into the home team’s danger area which the defender poked over the crossbar with his left foot. As the other end, Connor Ripley did well to save a shot from Cameron Brannagan with his legs after twenty-five minutes as the U’s Skipper bore down on him unchallenged. There were half-hearted shouts for a penalty from the home crowd as the ball bounced back to him and Bedeau made a tackle but Referee Ben Speedie was not interested. After this, Oxford forced a number of corners before the half-hour mark but the Shrimps’ defence was never seriously tested. Morecambe had more possession as the half progressed but didn’t seriously test home goalkeeper Simon Eastwood at any time. Up front, Jon Obika got very little change out of his former employers and Arthur Gnahoua was largely ineffective as well. At the back, though, Ryan Delaney was again immense and he was ably assisted by his fellow defenders throughout the half. So the half ended goal-less with not a great deal of excitement and few chances for either side.
The home crowd had been restless during the first half and some of them booed their team off the field at the end of proceedings. Karl Robinson went with the same eleven who had contested the opening phase of the match but Derek Adams made two changes. In an attempt to inject some punch into his forward line, Cole the Goal replaced Obika and Dylan Connolly took the place of Gnahoua. It paid dividends almost immediately. Ousmane Fané carried the ball forward and then set-up Donald Love to play a sumptuous ball forward to Weir, who opened his account for the Shrimps with an assured finish with just two minutes of the half played. A couple of minutes later, Connolly sped down the Morecambe right flank and picked-out Weir again with a good pass which the Brighton loanee could not convert this time. In the meantime, as the home crowd grew ever more restive, Oxford were limited to long-range efforts which never tested the visiting goalkeeper. Henry had a better chance after 54 minutes which went for a corner. From it, Kyle Joseph took advantage of confusion in the home defence and scored his first ever goal for the U’s by hooking the ball into the top corner of the net. Urged on by their suddenly noisy support, the home team started to put some pressure on the visitors for a while after they had equalised. Again, though, United were limited to long-range shots which all missed the target. It took until the sixty-seventh minute for the hosts to test Ripley again. Steve Seddon’s long cross was played to Henry by Bodin who crossed it to Joseph but the visiting goalkeeper was barely troubled by the resulting header. Brannagan came closer with 72 minutes on the clock but Ripley again did well to keep out his low shot. There was more bad news for the visitors as the always steady Liam Gibson was hurt following a challenge and had to go off to be replaced by Shane McLoughlin with less than twenty minutes left. United, meanwhile, increased the pressure on the Shrimps and forced a few more corners and long throws. Ripley was forced into action again after 76 minutes when he managed to push away another fierce strike from Brannagan. There were few further chances for either side but substitute Anthony O’Connor saved a certain goal for the U’s with a tremendous block in injury time from fellow-sub Slavi Spasov.
It was disappointing that, having taken the lead, Morecambe were not capable of holding on to all three points this afternoon. But a point on the road against a decent team isn’t a bad result for the Shrimps. Today’s was a battling defensive display by Derek Adams’ troops. The point wasn’t enough to stop the club falling to twenty-third in the Division, though and only Burton Albion lie between Morecambe and the bottom of the table. Having said that, however, the Shrimps are only one point behind Oxford, who remain in nineteenth place tonight. These were the Manager’s thoughts after the match:
“It was a very good game, Oxford are struggling at home to get wins and have lost their last two games. We went ahead with a well-worked goal and a great finish from Jensen Weir. It was a great, slip pass across and he finished it into the bottom corner. He took it really well, we broke down Oxford’s right; the opportunity came about because we pressed them high. It was great to go ahead in the game and we felt that we could probably hold on and take all three points. We dealt with the shape that Oxford tried; we limited them to very few opportunities on target and we were unfortunate not to take all three points. August has been a difficult month from a managerial point of view, playing Tuesday and Saturday but the players put in a really good shift after a run of hard away games.”
Oxford United: 13 Simon Eastwood; 3 Sam Long; 4 Stuart Findlay; 7 Billy Bodin (39 Slavi Spasov 67’); 8 Cameron Brannagan (C); 9 Matty Taylor; 16 Ciaron Brown (Y); 17 James Henry (27 Tyler Goodrham 85’); 18 Marcus McGuane (6 Gorrin Rodriguez (Y) 85’); 22 Kyle Joseph; 42 Steve Seddon.
Subs not used: 12 Jodi Jones; 21 Edward McGinty; 14 Lewis Bate; 15 John Mousinho.
Morecambe: 1 Connor Ripley; 2 Donald Love (C); 4 Liam Gibson (18 Shane McLoughlin 74’); 5 Farrend Rawson (Y); 6 Ryan Delaney; 7 Jake Taylor; 10 Ash Hunter (8 Ousmane Fané (Y) 6’); 14 Arthur Gnahoua (11 Dylan Connolly (Y) 45’); 15 Jensen Weir (22 Anthony O’Connor 79’); 16 Jacob Bedeau; 19 Jon Obika (9 Cole Stockton (Y) 45’).
Subs not used: 12 Adam Smith; 17 Caleb Watts.
Ref: Ben Speedie.
Att: 6,813 (130 from Morecambe).
