FAN’S VIEW 21/22 – NO.31

OXFORD UNITED 3 SHEFFIELD WEDNESDAY 2

This is a game that takes some getting your head around. With the visitors a goal up after seven minutes and playing some very impressive football as they bossed the game, with Barry Bannan pulling the strings, it didn’t seem at all likely that we would not only come back from behind twice but also go on to score a winner.

Throw in our poor recent performances plus the fact that we were without Herbie Kane, James Henry, Gavin Whyte, Ryan Williams and I’ll also add long term absentee Alex Gorrin and go on to say, no chance.

I thought the first half was quite reminiscent of what we had seen at Wycombe a week earlier. The opposition looked physically stronger. Without the ball we didn’t seem to have the shape to stop them doing what they wanted and whereas they were able to find space in midfield, we couldn’t do likewise. We just didn’t close down enough or appear to have the energy levels to match theirs. Once they’d scored there was the usual shithousery. An apparent age taken over throw-ins stood out.

Wednesday were getting tight on our defenders meaning playing out from the back was either impossible or at best too risky although we still did keep trying it too often for my liking. The problem is that the alternative is just as futile, high balls played in Matty Taylor’s direction which meant that possession was conceded way too easily.

It appeared that we’d learnt nothing. It appeared that plan A for this game was the same plan that had failed at Adams Park.

When one team is on top the other team, in this case us, tend to litter their game with mistakes when they do have the ball. More misplaced passes. More poor control. When a player sets off on a dribble the ball is knocked too far ahead. All that sort of stuff.

Obviously if the team as a whole is playing badly individuals will be having poor games and before the break there were quite a few who fell into that category. Sam Long was nowhere near his best. Jordan Thorniley didn’t look great either and Steve Seddon’s showing had some around me muttering he’s not a good enough defender, we need a new left-back. Yes he did look weak but with nowhere to go and no available team mate to pass to he did still get the ball from the returning Jack Stevens too often. It just wasn’t working.

It’s three of the back four I’ve mentioned here but their work load was probably higher than it should have been because our midfield were not restricting the space within which the Owls were operating and we weren’t paying enough attention to Bannan who is quite possibly the best player in L1.

I was once again getting frustrated with Marcus McGuane. That is probably because I thought he was going to shine for us and he has not yet hit any heights. It might be down to my perception, it might be that how he gets about the pitch is deceptive but at times he doesn’t give the impression that he is doing the hard yards. I know he can run with the ball and is great at cutting across opponents and winning fouls but for me passing the ball quicker would be helpful a lot of the time.

Their opener was a goal of great quality. The chase for a high ball played down our left was won by a striped shirt who laid it back to Jack Hunt. With no Oxford player nearby he was free to play a simple but very effective pass forward. Massimo Luongo, a player Swindon once paid £400k for, appeared to be pointing where he wanted the pass but let it run on by as he kept going, the ball ending up with Lee Gregory who first time found Luongo. He stopped it, turned and played it back to the edge of the box where Bannan smacked it perfectly on the rise with his left foot. It was fluid, all very joined up with us chasing shadows. The type of goal I greatly admire and like to applaud except when they are against us.

It wasn’t long before I considered it to be a case of getting to half time without going further behind and then taking stock from the sanctuary of the dressing room.

That second goal for Wednesday didn’t come and if the ever alert Taylor has even half a chance created for him there’s hope.

Will Finnie was one of the better referees we’ve seen officiating this season and probably did the right thing by adding four minutes on at the end of the first period. The way the game had gone I wasn’t overjoyed by this but 45+1 is a very nice time to get an equaliser thank you very much.

Nathan Holland who had a very quiet game was sent away down the left and he managed to control a bouncing ball which he played back to the unmarked McGuane. There is a quality player there and I still think he can come really good for us, honest. MM controlled, took a touch, looked up and then bent a delightful ball to the far post just over a taller defender onto the head of our predator who put it back across keeper Bailey Peacock-Farrell and into the net. His parent club, Burnley, paid £2.5m for the double barrelled custodian and perhaps that price tag weighs heavily to such an extent that it dragged him back over the goal line before he attempted to save Taylor’s first. Very poor positional sense.

So amazingly it was 1-1 at half time.

Chatting to a mate at half time he opined that our crowd was flat and that didn’t help the team. This is an oft had discussion. The crowd feeds off what they see on the pitch. Players on the pitch feed off the crowd getting behind them. It’s a circular thing. But chicken and egg. What comes first?

As for the crowd being flat, from the refined SSU we certainly seemed to be compared to the Wednesdayites. No doubt the view from the East Stand would differ but generally an away following is more together than home fans and the crowd of 10k plus (just) clearly had some who were relatively new to it all. Also it has to be said that there were some Owls in the home sections. Two were situated just to our left, afterwards a mate said that there were some near him too and the Wednesday fan I chatted to in the Catherine Wheel (it wasn’t the range of ales that tempted me in, oh no) had a ticket for the East stand.  Extrapolate that throughout and there may well have been a significant number of infiltrators. I don’t blame them one little bit. The full allocation they were given went just like that. The Wednesday website said it was 1,432. The away following quoted in the match report on OUFC is 1,444. One has to do what one has to do to watch your team. Some of us always got into Luton when a blanket ban applied to away fans.

When they scored the two near us weren’t giving it large but it was blatantly obvious who they supported. That pissed me off but probably because we’d let a goal in more than anything else. Football means so much to so many people and when you take a hit it hurts.

The Wednesday support impressed me. Yes there was a rendition of “my garden shed” but for the most part the vocals emanating from their section was all about supporting their team.

Proper support is what is needed at this point in time as we are on a downward spiral with regard to behaviour at football matches. Anyone who attends regularly home and away, unless they’ve had their eyes closed, will have noticed this post lockdown. A day or so ago there was a BBC headline “Football arrests ‘highest in years’ & disorder on the rise – police” and the article told that here have been more than 800 football-related arrests in the first six months of the season, alongside more than 750 reported incidents of disorder. On Saturday we had Villa players floored by bottles thrown at Goodison Park. At the Kassam it was our turn to have a moron pitch invader. Straight across to the travellers in the 84^th minute. As ever why? Drink, drugs, a desire for a lengthy or life time ban? It’s embarrassing. Wonder what would have happened if the stewards had helped him on his way, over the barriers and into the away support. I’ve seen no club statement or anything in the press on this.

Paper plane kit provided on every seat

On a much lower level but something else that irritates me is the making of paper planes and launching them pitch wards. Watch the bloody game. And even after Mr Finnie had made it clear that any that made it onto the playing surface would need removing, a few more were sent on their way.

Back to the football.

At half time the warm up routine Luke McNally was being put through told us he would be joining the fray. He’s more than an adequate replacement for Elliott Moore and what followed was a Plan B, a plan that would have likely been followed if our captain was injured.

I’m someone who is quite slow in picking up formations and changes thereof but with three at the back (or five if you count the wing-backs) we’d gone from a four and it was a different game.

We were much more Wednesday’s equals. We looked to have better shape and were getting stuck in more, winning more battles.

That said there were still worrying signs with opponents being allowed to carry the ball way too far unhindered. On one occasion Peacock-Farrell rolled the ball to a colleague who was then able to progress all the way from his own area to ours. Letting that happen is proof that the problems we’d encountered in the first half had not been entirely fixed.

On the hour mark we were behind once more and to be fair to the Owls it was another delightfully worked goal and quite similar to their first. Fisayo Dele-Bashiru used his strength before finding a team-mate out wide. No Oxford player went with Josh Windass, who had only just come on, as he made a run across the box. When the ball came in, he dummied over it, allowing it to run to Gregory, bent his run around one of our defenders and hit the first time pass from his number 9 with clinical efficiency past Jack Stevens.

Even though we had been much better in the second half I thought now that was probably it.

Nothing of the sort. Far from it. We re-started the game and just 22 seconds later it was 2-2.

Taylor to Cameron Brannagan, to McNally who launches it. Sam Hutchinson under challenge from Taylor gets his head on the ball but can’t get it away. He has a second go but Billy Bodin, who had a good steady game, gathers with purpose. He finds Seddon. We’re not hanging about. We’re going for it at pace. SS passes first time to Holland and wants the return immediately. Holland has other ideas. He turns and shoots but the shot is deflected right into the path of Taylor who stretches once to keep the ball in the danger zone and again to force it goalwards. Peacock-Farrell blocks but Matty blocks the block with his knee and from inches out he’s taken himself up to joint fifth in the L1 goal-scoring charts.

The Windass goal is recorded as being scored in the 60^th minute MT’s second in the 62^nd minute. Given so few seconds of actual football were played between the two this shows how much time is taken up with goal celebrations.

Even now given that, I thought we still looked a bit porous and knowing what Wednesday could produce I thought we’d need at least one more goal to assure ourselves of a point.

Again, wrong. With six minutes of the 90 remaining we had a corner. Bodin placed a teaser into the crowd scene and it was met by Sam Winnall who helped it on its way with a powerful glanced flick. Call it what you will, it was a goal-scorers finish.

When Winnall came on for Holland ten minutes earlier the comments of “Sam’s day will come” were more in hope than genuine belief and also knowing that however much a player has disappointed in a yellow shirt for whatever reason, the right thing to do is get behind them when they are representing your club.

In the time he was on the pitch I was well pleased with what he did. He looked fitter than he has done before this season. I’d go as far as saying that when he ran away to celebrate his goal he was quicker than when he’d tried to get around the pitch in the other minutes he’s played for us this season. Here he put himself about and fiercely contested high balls. If we could guarantee that he won’t break down again, the need for another centre-forward is greatly reduced.

The seven added minutes meant we had to negotiate a total of 13 without conceding to secure all three points. There’s no getting away from the fact that it was only absolutely woeful finishing from the visitors in the very dying stages that saw us over the line, but what a win.

If I were a Wednesday fan I’d be asking how that happened. How could a team produce such stunning goals yet miss sitters and concede three? That my friends is football. Sometimes you come out on top, sometimes not. When you are on the receiving end you have to suck it up. One of the Wednesday fans near us left before the end. He was not in the best of moods. But the award for not being totally unable to suck it up goes to the Sheffield Wednesday employee a little bit further along from us at the back of the stand with his monitor watching and analysing the game. Every time we scored he lost the plot like a spoilt entitled brat and kicked the back of the stand. Hilarious.