Hull and high Waterman

The visitors to the Kassam Stadium this Saturday are Hull City, who will be hoping that Oxford return to their home form, rather than maintain their away form. United, fresh from three wins on the bounce, will almost certainly keep the same line-up as has performed so successfully at Boston and Orient, even though that means playing three central defenders, with Adie Viveash between Andy Crosby and Matt Bound. Ian Atkins is hoping to make Viveash's loan spell into a permanent transfer, which should please most fans despite the lad's past.

The big decision that Atkins has to make is whether to keep with Paul Powell as left wingback or recall Matt Robinson, should he have regained fitness. Less of a problem is what to do with Dave Waterman, who has now completed his three match ban. A place on the bench is probably the best that the midfielder can hope for due to commanding displays from the current trio of Bobby Ford, James Hunt and Dave Savage.

Up front there has been talk that Lee Steele could be fit enough to take up a place as substitute, but it may not be worth the risk, especially with options in Manny Omoyinmi and Jefferson Louis should the need arise. Much as we would all like to see Steele in action it is more important that he is allowed to recover from his injuries properly rather than being rushed back for the sake of it, especially as Andy Scott suddenly seems to have remembered where the goal is.

Hull lost 3-1 at home to Macclesfield in midweek and their away record is as poor as United's home record. As pre-season promotion favourites (for the second year running) this game will obviously not be a walkover (especially given United's home form) but with the lads still on a high from the last three games Rage Online fully expects them to pull out all the stops. 0-0.