Oxford United look to make it back-to-back wins when they travel to Derby County on Tuesday evening.
A 1-0 win at home to Carlisle gave Liam Manning’s side their first three points of the season and they will look to build on that as they travel to Pride Park.
“It’s another tough game but they all are” he said. “We go through the same process no matter who we are playing. First and foremost we will show the opposition respect, we will do our work on them in preparation and we will make sure we are clear in terms of our own gameplan. It’s a difficult place to go when you look at the history and the fan base and it’s understandable why they are favourites this season but that doesn’t change anything we do or the belief we have in ourselves. Knowing the quality we have in our group I am confident we can go there and get something.
“We believe in the work that we do and the work we do on the training pitch, the video work we do, the recruitment we have done and the group of lads we have here, and that allows us stability and to prepare for each game as they come along”
United will be without defender Jordan Thorniley with an ankle injury but Stephan Negru stepped into the side and looked very solid on Saturday while there is good news on James Henry who is approaching a return to training.
“Jordan will be out for a few weeks. We have a few follow up appointments in the next few days but we don’t expect him to be available in the next few weeks. But Stephan Negru stepped in and did really well on Saturday. From the first day we were here Stephan caught the eye of me, Chris Hogg and Craig Short and huge credit is due to him for the way he was ready and switched on when he got his chance last week.
“James has had a pain in his achilles, nothing major but just something for us to manage with an eye on the longer term. He is close to joining in again now.”
Liam believes that Saturday’s first win will give the U’s a major boost as they strive for consistency in Sky Bet League 1
“We will take all the positives from the first three games” he said. “Any new side will take time to find a level of consistency but we will work constantly to address that and we will travel up to Derby, control what we can control, be hard to beat, try to dominate with the ball and ultimately, try to win the game.”
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