At last, after five games without one, Oxford United have finally scored a goal, and a match-winning one at that. Phil Trainer's strike against Crawley Town, in the second minute of the second half, was the first league goal that United have scored at home since the 3-3 draw with Torquay United on 11 October, and it earned the Us their first home Conference win since they beat Salisbury City 2-1 on 25 September, three months ago.[@news]2243[/@news] [@opponent]crawley town[/@opponent]

There was little hint in a turgid first half that the Yellows were about to break their goalscoring drought. Eight minutes in Trainer had the first shot on goal, but his effort from the edge of the area was straight at Ashley Bayes. That was the only save the Crawley keeper was called on to make in the opening period, and with Billy Turley having a similarly quiet afternoon at the other end this wasn't a half to awaken the spectators from their post-festive snoozes. The frustration boiled over somewhat in the East Stand, when a couple of people vented their feelings (and their lunches) at Turley, for some bizarre reason. As the rest of the crowd let these people know how wrong they were, they reacted venomously, and had to be escorted from the ground.

The second half, though, started with a bang, as Trainer was played in by Rob Duffy and shot first time from the edge of the area to beat Bayes. This immediately improved the atmosphere, as United's confidence started to return. Duffy shot wide shortly after the goal, and 20 minutes later Trainer ran across the edge of the area before shooting narrowly wide. After that, Crawley began to pin United back and a great tackle from Matt Day denied Magno Vieira. Turley then had to save from Mustapha Carayol as the Us began to drop too deep, and looked to defend their lead rather than increase it. The pressure was lifted on a couple of occasions, once from a storming run by Eddie Hutchinson, and the relief when the final whistle was blown was palpable.

Darren Patterson made a number of changes to the team that lost at Aldershot in the Setanta Shield on Saturday. Turley replaced Sam Warrell in goal, United's number one having recovered from his shoulder injury, while Barry Quinn dropped back into defence in place of Mickey Corcoran. Hutchinson returned to midfield to take Quinn's place, while Trainer came back into the side in place of Danny Rose, who limped off at the Rec. Twenty minutes into the second half Joel Ledgister was replaced by Gary Twigg, and with six minutes left James Clark came on for Day.

The referee today was