U's boss gets ready for Barnet away
Oxford United pay their first ever trip to The Hive on Saturday as they take on Barnet at their new ground. The U’s earned the first chink of daylight in second place in the table with a 4-0 win over Dagenham and Redbridge on Tuesday night, but Head Coach Michael Appleton knows that Barnet will be fighting for their lives as they try to do the double over the U’s this season.“I thought the game at our place was tough to take” Michael told Yellow Player HD. “We had seven minutes of madness but the rest of the performance was very good that day. Some of our attacking play was great but we didn’t really punish them.
“Barnet will be a tough side. They are very difficult on their own patch where they have already beaten Plymouth, Portsmouth and Bristol Rovers this year. That just shows the size of the task we face.”
That 4-0 midweek demolition of Dagenham boosted confidence in the U’s squad and sets up the run-in nicely.
“The confidence has always been high” Michael said. “I think the phrase I used on Tuesday was that we looked like a side who not only wanted to win but needed to win. I felt we had an extra edge to us.
“I said to the players that they need that mentality in every game now. It’s got to the stage now where second chances don’t come often.
“We need to get over any setbacks pretty quickly and it was good to have the game on Tuesday so soon after the Orient match. We have a little break after Saturday so we need to get a positive result, and then we have two games in three days over Easter which will be a big weekend for football.”
See the full interview and hear Michael’s thoughts on the return to the bench of Jake Wright in midweek as well as one or two possible options for the coming weeks, all in Yellow Player HD
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