The 2026/27 season starts on Saturday with a trip to Leyton Orient in the League Cup.

Given all that’s gone on during the close season, United fans might be forgiven for thinking that the new season is already old, with former chairman Grant Ferguson stepping down to be replaced by the elusive Dusan Bogdanovic, followed by sacking of Matt Bloomfield, followed shortly by the appointment of Aaron Ramsey, followed shortly by the imposition of a registration embargo on the club, leading to speculation about the future of various players, not least among them being the outstanding Stan Mills.

Oxford did release nine player at the start of the summer, along with the five loan players returning to their parent clubs, Myles Peart-Harris not renewing his contract, and the departures of Ole Romeny (on loan to Fortuna Sittard), Nik Prelec (sold to Jagiellonia Białystok), and most recently Will Vaulks (left for Tranmere Rovers), to make the total number of departures 19. The fact that the club still has 25 first team players on its roster (including the only arrival, Frankie Kent who, as luck would have it, received an injury in training that will leave him sidelined for most of the season) shows just how bloated the squad was last season.

In addition to Kent, Jeon Jin-Woo injured his back and will be out for at least a couple of months, and Ruben Roosken was injured in the pre-season win over Crawley Town, leaving him sidelined for “months, not weeks” according to Ramsey. The status of Marselino Ferdinan is unknown – has he signed a contract extension or has he returned to Indonesia for good? He is still listed on the club’s official website, but with no squad number allocated (although neither have Kent, Peter Kioso, James Golding, Louie Sibley, or Aidomo Emakhu, so that doesn’t really tell us anything).

Two players: Brian De Keersmaecker and Michał Helik, apparently have release clauses in their contracts, so either or both could be off at a moment’s notice. And with the club unable to sign replacements, it does rather make it essential that the rest of the squad, including Mills (who has been heavily linked with a move to Preston North End), is retained.

We have written before about the embargo, and while nothing has changed substantially since then, Bogdanovic has broken his silence with a Zoom call (or was it Teams?) with the chairs of OxVox and the Fans’ Advisory Board, who both felt positive after the online meeting. However, as Bogdanovic himself said: actions speak louder than words. So we will maintain a healthy scepticism while we await these actions. We hope that he’s right when he says the embargo was due to timing rather than cash-flow issues, but he also reiterated that the club won’t be meeting the requirements necessary to get the embargo lifted until after the summer transfer window closes, which still leaves everything up in the air.

So what we really need is some football to take our minds off everything, and that is going to happen on Saturday.

Despite all the off-field issues, United go into the first competitive game of the new season in good shape, having won all four pre-season matches, starting with a 3-1 win from behind at Aldershot. This was followed by a resilient display as the side beat Barnet 2-1 at the Hive (can recommend the nearby Sri Rathiga curry house, should anyone be near Edgware for any reason) and then a 3-1 win at home to Crawley. The final game saw the U’s overcome Premier League Ipswich Town’s second string 2-0. A perfect pre-season leaves us all anxious about what the season proper might have in store.

The Game

Caretaker manager Craig Short and the United players celebrate on United’s last visit to Orient

Seeing as we have to travel to Brisbane Road again on New Year’s Day, I’ll leave most of the usual history stuff until then. Suffice to say that we have never played the O’s in any cup tie away from home. The last time we went there, in the 2023/24 promotion season, United raced into a 3-0 lead before eventually clinging on to win 3-2.

Orient’s preparations for the new season took a bit of a blow last week, when last season’s Golden Boot winner, and League One Young Player of the Season, Dom Ballard joined Bristol City for £5 million. It does give Orient money to strengthen, but hopefully not in time for Saturday’s encounter.

They have signed Oman international striker Tariq Al Sadi on a short-term deal and Ipswich defender Somto Boniface on loan until the end of the season, as well as centre-back Joseph Olowu from Stockport on a permanent contract. Their squad also features former Oxford players Fin Stevens, Sean Clare, and Idris El Mizouni, while Oxford’s former head of recruitment Scott Mitchell is now the O’s Director of Football.

For United fans, the big excitement is what team Ramsey will select for his first real game in charge. The formations for the friendlies suggest that he is a fan of the line-up preferred by Des Buckingham, with a deep lying midfielder in front of the defence and two more attacking midfielders closer to the front three (most likely to be Jamie McDonnell as the sitter, and Cameron Brannagan and Tyler Goodrham further forward). Judging by the line-up in the Ipswich game, the back four in front of Jamie Cumming will comprise Brodie Spencer on the right and Jack Currie on the left, with Sam Long (seemingly preferred to Helik) alongside Ciaron Brown. Assuming he’s still with us, Mills will probably be on the right of the front three, with Emakhu the other side of Mark Harris.

The problem the team has, and which will be with us until January should nothing change, is strength in depth, especially in midfield and up top. This means that a reasonable proportion of the bench will likely be former youth-team players such as Gatlin O’Donkor, Aiden Elliott-Wheeler, Leo Snowden, and Harrison Bradney, all of whom impressed in the friendlies but none of whom (with the possible exception of GOD) has any first-team experience.

With Simon Eastwood the back-up goalie, that leaves Kioso, Helik, and Greg Leigh as the reserve defenders; De Keersmaecker (who hasn’t played a minute of the pre-season games) and Sibley in midfield; and Siriki Dembélé (in from the cold) as the only experienced reserves. Any more injuries and the squad will look even more threadbare.

We know Orient are a decent side, with players such as Will Forrester, Isaac Hayden, and Armando Dobra in their squad, so even with United at full strength this is going to be a tough test. But it’s a cup game, the first match of the new campaign, and a decent away following. Who knows what will happen? As always, we travel in hope, but also with a wee bit of expectation thrown in for good measure. It’s a sunny day in the capital, so what could possibly go wrong?