Mickey Lewis[@player]lewis, mickey[/@player] has been appointed to replace Darren Patterson as Oxford's youth-team coach. Mad Dog was a midfield favourite with many United fans throughout the 1990s, and he even had a spell as caretaker manager for a while, as well as physio and youth team coach. Since his time at Oxford he was assistant manager to Ed Denton at Slough Town, and then had the same role with Dave Penney at Doncaster Rovers. He has a tough act to follow, as Patto's team won their league championship without losing a single game last season.

The club has also announced that six of its second-year scholars are being released. Now that clubs only offer two years at scholarship level, instead of three as before, it makes it that much harder for kids to break through to the first team, as with wage-cap restrictions the clubs have to be fairly sure that they will be up to first-team duties despite being just 18 years old, or less. The unlucky sextet are Jerome Anderson, Daniel Meade, Andrew Younie, Chris Weedon, Gareth Tucker, and Tommy Franklin. However, on the plus side, United have extended the contracts of the three long-term injury victims, Gareth Malloy, Luke Bennett, and the Rage Online sponsored Ben Weedon. United have also taken on seven new scholars, plus Alex Fisher and Declan Benjamin.

Meanwhile, Buildbase have extended their sponsorship of the club for another year. The Oxford-based company first sponsored the Us in 2001, the season that United moved into the Minchery Farm stadium. With United having introduced two new shirts this season, as a result of the new deal with Carlotti replacing TFG, this is good news for replica kit buyers, as it means that the club will only replace one shirt next season.