Oxford United 0 Gillingham 0 (From The Oxford Times)

Have to say the Jury is still out on Morgan, and must admit earlier in the season Andy Whing took time to settle and gain match fitness but has won over the supporters, and playing in the middle protects the back line well, another that took time was Johnson but again he has done the business when given enough playing time. After taking time to ponder after this game I feel we are seeing a very similar character to Alfie Potter, he has good feet but does not get through to make many crosses or strikes on target.
But the manner he left the field of play today was an absolute joke, the guy has got to win over the crowd and to sit and watch from the oppositions penalty area then walk towards the dugout was a farce in itself, if he stays down rather than stroll across the pitch may have been a better choice as he was not going to contribute from where he was anyway. He needs to take a good look at himself and realise he needs to become a member of the team rather than bemoan balls he can't/won't chased down, which was evident when one ball out from Wayne Brown was not to his feet and then started blaming him for bad delivery.
At this stage of the season we are still in a position to control our own destiny, let's see more clinical finishing, the passing games is there, but don't try to do so much.

Rather a lot of emotion today at County Ground. Yes we won 1-0 against a Plymouth side who battled well, but the whole day was soured by the tragic news that our manager's mother sadly passed away late last night.

There was no, welcoming of the players back into the tunnel and his traditional celebration with the supporters at the end of the game.. Our Chief Exec had to take to the field with a radio mike to make the announcement as around 8,000 from our crowd today sang his name and called for his company on the field. It had all been a well kept secret. Instead of jubilation we all came home deflated and mournful for the man who has given his all for us this season. The real side of the decent supporters who in their many thousands at clubs up and down our land came to the fore.
Like him or loathe him he has single handed put respect back into our club, and tonight despite our points tally we respect him,and our celebrations will wait for another day.

Morgan was clearly injured & that is why he left the field in the way he did.

For the Oxford fans to boo two substitutions today was unbelievable. Sometimes we don't deserve the club we have. Get behind the team.

Personally, I feel that promotion is too early for us this season. We need to strengthen a little and improve taking our chances before we can progress.

Smilingbo wrote:
Morgan was clearly injured & that is why he left the field in the way he did.

For the Oxford fans to boo two substitutions today was unbelievable. Sometimes we don't deserve the club we have. Get behind the team.

Personally, I feel that promotion is too early for us this season. We need to strengthen a little and improve taking our chances before we can progress.

Good comments, promotion would be exciting, but clearly we would do a Chesterfield. It's pointless going up if we don't have it, I'd sooner be in this division one more season if it means getting the team into some sort of consistent unit. priority is as we all know someone who can find the net.

dave from witney wrote:

Smilingbo wrote:
Morgan was clearly injured & that is why he left the field in the way he did.

For the Oxford fans to boo two substitutions today was unbelievable. Sometimes we don't deserve the club we have. Get behind the team.

Personally, I feel that promotion is too early for us this season. We need to strengthen a little and improve taking our chances before we can progress.

Good comments, promotion would be exciting, but clearly we would do a Chesterfield. It's pointless going up if we don't have it, I'd sooner be in this division one more season if it means getting the team into some sort of consistent unit. priority is as we all know someone who can find the net.

I have a season ticket in the Oxford Mail stand and to watch how we created chances but couldn't put them away has shown me that we aren't going to be able to cement a place in league 1 like Stevenage and Bury have done, I can't believe what the rush is all about to gain promotion. Next season with all our top players back will be exciting, I don't believe that Wilder is the man to blame, he can't control injuries. I would love to play the Scum again next season but we do need 5 or 6 new faces to put away our many chances. Also the supporters behind me where an absolute disgrace when Morgan went down I said to the guy by me that I could see that he was injured. Wilder and co have a right after the game to blast the supporters because it isn't ever good to boo any player. We will gain promotion when we have the players. Do you think Crawley will survive? I'm doubting it. Come on you Yellows!

As much as I would love to see us be in and win the play-offs the squad we have is well short being able to hold it`s own at a higher level. I reckon only 6 of this squad are good enough.
However as a club we should stick together. Chris Wilder has got us out of the Conference and well placed in League 2, yesterdays boos for the two substitutions was a disgrace. Adam Chapman was not having his best game and Dean Morgan should have stayed down but the reaction he got from the East Stand was not pleasant, and would destroy any self belief he had.
Scott Rendell works his socks of for us and has proved to be a good loan.
Lets stick together for the next 3 games, get the results we need and see what happens in the play-offs.
As for next season lets see which league we are in.

Too many loan rangers, and not enough commitment imo.
CW has done well getting some sort of consistency, albeit in patches. If we fail to go up then i hope the manager and coach have some Quality signings lined up so that we can have a real go next season.

the wizard wrote:
Rather a lot of emotion today at County Ground. Yes we won 1-0 against a Plymouth side who battled well, but the whole day was soured by the tragic news that our manager's mother sadly passed away late last night.

There was no, welcoming of the players back into the tunnel and his traditional celebration with the supporters at the end of the game.. Our Chief Exec had to take to the field with a radio mike to make the announcement as around 8,000 from our crowd today sang his name and called for his company on the field. It had all been a well kept secret. Instead of jubilation we all came home deflated and mournful for the man who has given his all for us this season. The real side of the decent supporters who in their many thousands at clubs up and down our land came to the fore.
Like him or loathe him he has single handed put respect back into our club, and tonight despite our points tally we respect him,and our celebrations will wait for another day.

this is an oxford site,we do not care!

I agree with Mac 27 what happens at Swindon is of no interest and when will they get the message.

I know others will disagree but we have not been good enough from day one.You only had to be at Rotherham, Sheffield and Bradford to see how poor we have been on too many occasion this season.

Iin my view we have three players perhaps four who have the ability to play in Div 1. I am sorry but two points from three home matches, the story of our home form all season and if it is not Chris Wilder's fault then who do we blame. I give him until end of September and if we are not in the top three then a change has to be made, because if we make the play offs we are not ready for promotion.

Brian Gibbs wrote:
I agree with Mac 27 what happens at Swindon is of no interest and when will they get the message.

I know others will disagree but we have not been good enough from day one.You only had to be at Rotherham, Sheffield and Bradford to see how poor we have been on too many occasion this season.

Iin my view we have three players perhaps four who have the ability to play in Div 1. I am sorry but two points from three home matches, the story of our home form all season and if it is not Chris Wilder's fault then who do we blame. I give him until end of September and if we are not in the top three then a change has to be made, because if we make the play offs we are not ready for promotion.

Yes it does seem you have enough problems of your own - without us rubbing salt in it.

Keep calm and carry on.

Have a good week you lot.

2pts from last 4 games 4 out of bottom 7 in division have taken points off us we don't deserve a play off spot. Wilder getting off lightly from fans and I'm slightly baffled by that. I like Wilder he's an honest guy but he's limited in ability and has the makings of a lower league journeyman manager at best.

I don't accept we would struggle in League 1 we have a nucleus of good players but we have a weak disorganised team overseen by an unimaginative coach. Lots of teams suffer injuries but get on with it and we have bigger resources than teams above us who clearly have far more consistency than we do. I really can't see how we can progress under Wilder. Having said that I'll be the first to accept I'm wrong if we manage to scrape through play offs and win at Wembley.

adlibber wrote:
2pts from last 4 games 4 out of bottom 7 in division have taken points off us we don't deserve a play off spot. Wilder getting off lightly from fans and I'm slightly baffled by that. I like Wilder he's an honest guy but he's limited in ability and has the makings of a lower league journeyman manager at best.

I don't accept we would struggle in League 1 we have a nucleus of good players but we have a weak disorganised team overseen by an unimaginative coach. Lots of teams suffer injuries but get on with it and we have bigger resources than teams above us who clearly have far more consistency than we do. I really can't see how we can progress under Wilder. Having said that I'll be the first to accept I'm wrong if we manage to scrape through play offs and win at Wembley.

Potter out, Capaldi out, Craddock out, Leven out, Heslop out, Pittman out. No manager can be blamed for injuries it is a fact of the human body. We do have too many loanees playing but who else do we have to call upon no one to be honest we have had some consistency to stay in the play-offs some people are so fickle and quick to challenge the manager or there decisions.

fickle? bizarre Craddock was poor before injury Potter suffered loss of form Heslop is average - your faith is admirable if a tad blind. Wilder is average.

adlibber wrote:
fickle? bizarre Craddock was poor before injury Potter suffered loss of form Heslop is average - your faith is admirable if a tad blind. Wilder is average.

On what experience or knowledge are you basing your oh-so-certain and scathing judgements? In your previous post you described the team as 'disorganised' - the last word anyone who knows about football would use. I've seen loads of disorganised sides at the club and Wilder's isn't one of them. As for Craddock being 'poor before injury', which injury are you talking about? I agree he didn't look great when he returned briefly in December after his long lay-off, but give him a break: he was working his way back to full match sharpness and then started struggling with a second injury. Before his first injury - i.e. last season - he was probably the best finisher at the club, and given our current problems in front of goal I'd say he's been a big loss.

By the way, you say in your first post that "I really can't see how we can progress under Wilder. Having said that I'll be the first to accept I'm wrong if we manage to scrape through play offs and win at Wembley". That's pathetic - it seems you judge the manager purely by scorelines here and scorelines there. There's MUCH more to it than that, and the reason why "the manager is getting off lightly from the fans" which you say "slightly baffles" you, is that large numbers of us can see that Wilder's beneficial impact on the club as a whole has been IMMENSE. There's nothing "blind" about our "faith" - not that I'd use that naff religious term: I'd just say we know something about football.

As previous comments have pointed out I do feel after watching Oxford this season we may be just one season to early for the next step up. Don't get me wrong it would be great to go up via the play-offs but....and its a big but the up and down form we have shown this season would just be magnified one league up and the worst thing we could do is yo-yo. It would cause far to much damage to the playing ethos in the club. I agree with most posters on here although sometimes Mr Wilder baffles me with things he does I feel he has the clubs best interests at heart and would give him one more season. If this time next year we are not at least in the auto's for league two then yes look for a fresh face until then lets get behind the man..... and not forget where we were this time not that long ago!

A year too early!! what are you lot on about?? We will have a massive clear out in the summer(as always) sign loads of players by start october C.W will run out of ideas and get desperate so sign loan players again, give the team a right kick in the teeth (as always) then moan he gets a few injuries. I think theres a pattern here. Our problems this year are poor formation, we never have any width this hurts us both when attacking and defending and C.W being negative i.e how many games have we drawn 15/16 ive lost count bet its the most in league 2!!

riding our luck to still be in playoffs given our recent results but we are still in with a chance so weve got to go for it. if we were to be successful then the team would need considerable strengthening ,and im sure that cw and the chairman are well aware of that.injuries to key players has meant that we are having to rely too much on loanees but we just have to get on with it and hope that we get the results we need.

For what it's worth, I thought that Wayne Brown had a good game. His kick-outs were better than Clarke's and his quick distribution by throwing or rolling the ball out kept the game moving very well.

Also, surely Andy "Max Branning" Whing must be in the frame for Player of the Season.

Big Yellow Scarf - you need to take your goggles off because you're clearly looking at a different league table. You're not very good in a debate are you at least not without insults to carry you through it. If I know nothing about football it's probably twice as much as your knowledge of it.

I stand by my comments because results don't lie and we are falling apart at the worst possible time and Wilder doesn't seem capable of addressing the problem or is this all just a ruse? Feel free to steam in with your mix of patronising glibness and laughable derision. I'll just keep my eye on where we are in league,how many points we've gained and goals we've scored/conceded ok?

disco80 and adlibber have got it spot on. We do not have a Div one striker (or poss div 2) that is consistent. Loan players are only a temporary fix for a month. Time to take offers on JC.

Wow. Reading a majority of these comments you would probably think we are somewhere near the bottom of the league or something without looking at the table. Unbelievably negative and ridculous. Whilst yes it is disappointing not to win games etc but in this league anyone can pretty much beat anyone. There are some decent players in most teams.
But back to Oxford. Do you all really think that this negativity is helping the team?? Jake wright sounded disheartened on the radio after the game by the fans. This type of negativity can and will turn players away from the club. I want Oxford to go up as much as anyone. To boo players at this point in the season with so much to play for is a joke and a disgrace. Wilder has been immense for us. One major problem has been injuries and therefore we haven't had a consistent line up. JC has had an off season as we all know. These things happen. Selling him is ridiculous. We all know he can score goals. The reason for the loan players though is due to injuries. Take get rid of montano, Rendell and Morgan. We then only have a half fit Pittman. An inconsistent JC and Oli who has done well. But that wouldn't be enough.
Another thing. Look at some of the teams below us. You would have expected Rotherham, gillingham, Bristol Rovers to name a couple to be up nearer the top. But that's football. Another day and we would have won Saturday. Gillingham got lucky that they had players in the right spot in the right time to block our efforts. We just got unlucky.
So get behind the team!!! Stop the negativity. It's getting embarrassing to say the least.

adlibber wrote:
Big Yellow Scarf - you need to take your goggles off because you're clearly looking at a different league table. You're not very good in a debate are you at least not without insults to carry you through it. If I know nothing about football it's probably twice as much as your knowledge of it.

I stand by my comments because results don't lie and we are falling apart at the worst possible time and Wilder doesn't seem capable of addressing the problem or is this all just a ruse? Feel free to steam in with your mix of patronising glibness and laughable derision. I'll just keep my eye on where we are in league,how many points we've gained and goals we've scored/conceded ok?

No, I'll keep my goggles on, thanks - goggles help you see more clearly. The same can't be said for your blinkers: your view is so narrow, limited to scorelines ("how many points we've gained and goals we've scored/conceded" etc.), that you really don't get the bigger picture. Your simplistic view is, unfortunately for some clubs, shared by the more clueless and unenlightened owners and chairmen, and it almost always leads to grief and disaster. Fortunately for Oxford United, ours have a broader vision and more intelligence. Oops, sorry, there I go insulting you again by implication - how terrible of me to insult someone who spends his whole time slagging people off.

Come on you yellows. And well said ralphington89 in the last post - spot on.