Port Vale 3 Oxford United 0

George Dugdale

GETTY IMAGES

Oxford United were comprehensively beaten by high-flying Port Vale in front of the TV cameras. Tom Pope, Ashley Vincent and Sam Morsy took advantage of United's defensive lapses to make it a miserable evening in Burslem.

Chris Wilder made three changes to the side which defeated Cheltenham Town in midweek. Johnny Mullins, Jake Wright and Sean Rigg returned in place of Daniel Boateng, Tony Capaldi and Peter Leven. The Scot was unable to take a place on the bench, meaning that youngsters Tyrone Marsh and Dave Lynn were named in the United 18.

Former Port Vale Sean Rigg was looking to impress on his return to Vale Park and the watching Sky cameras showed the extent of the swerve on his early long-range effort. From the corner that resulted from Chris Neal's fingertip save, Johnny Mullins headed into the side netting.

After a solid opening spell for the visitors, the threat of Vale's leading scorer Tom Pope was evident after eight minutes. The striker made space on the left of the penalty area and forced Ryan Clarke to tip his deflected effort onto the crossbar.

Short-lived Oxford United player Jennison Myrie-Williams shot into the side-netting after the fifteen minute mark, before James Constable ended a bright Oxford passing move by doing likewise at the other end.

The TV statistics revealed that the hosts were dominating possession in the opening quarter and they came close to making this count after eighteen minutes. Ashley Vincent wriggled free in the penalty area, only to be denied by a superb block by Oxford captain Jake Wright.

The half-chances continued seconds later, with Simon Heslop blazing over the bar from the edge of the penalty area.

The game settled down midway through the half as Wright and Worley dealt well with the aerial threat of Pope, but they couldn't keep the in-form striker down for long. A long ball deceived Mullins and after Clarke denied Dodds, Pope was on hand to tap home.

The home side grew in confidence after the opener and looked to double their advantage as Vincent fired over from the edge of the box.

They very nearly succeeded in finding a second as Mullins flicked Vincent's cross against his own post. United were under pressure and the half-time whistle couldn't come quickly enough.

Craddock linked well with Constable before seeing a shot deflected wide to divert the flow of attacks, but Myrie-Williams reminded United of the threat as he lashed wide on the counter-attack a minute later.

Clarke was sharply down to his right to deny a Pope header, before Constable appeared to be bundled over as he advanced into the box. Whether it was inside or not is another matter, but the viewing OUFC Twitter army tapped away in furious protest. Somewhere in the south-west, Lee Mansell stated that it was never a penalty. As his judgement was always poor, it must have been blatant.

The half-time whistle brought welcome relief for Oxford and Tony Capaldi replaced Luke O'Brien as United looked to stem the threat of Myrie-Williams on the flank.

However, things went from bad to worse six minutes later. Another straight long-ball wasn't dealt with, allowing Ashley Vincent to dink the ball home from the tightest of angles. A disastrous goal to concede and suddenly Oxford had a mountain to climb.

It could have been even worse moments later as Capaldi left a back-pass short and Clarke had to be alert to deny substitute Chris Shuker.

Sam Morsy was fortunate to only see yellow for a lunge on Forster-Caskey, before substitute Alfie Potter sliced wide after turning well outside the box.

Morsy made the most of his good fortune on the hour as he curled a fine finish around Ryan Clarke for Vale's third.

The game was up for the visitors, but Craddock reminded Neal that there was still a game going on as he stung the goalkeeper's palms with a near-post volley.

A menacing ball from Forster-Caskey caused concern in the Vale defence in the seventieth minute, although Clarke was then forced to save well from Myrie-Williams after a rapid Vale counter-attack.

If the problem in the first half had been the final ball, the first one was proving a greater issue in the second. Sean Rigg blazed over after United had fashioned space in a rare moment of second half promise, but Vincent could have extended the lead as he fired wide a minute later.

The six days in January 2011 where Myrie-Williams looked to be an Oxford player seem a long time ago and never more so than when he crashed an effort off the Oxford bar after dancing through the visiting defence.

There was a welcome positive as Andy Whing came off the bench to get another ten minutes under his belt, but the happy moments were few and far between.

For every positive there was a blow and the late booking for Wright means that he will miss the game against Accrington at the weekend.

As the final whistle ended a miserable evening for Oxford, the tidy opening period was a distant memory. Port Vale are a good side, but the goals conceded were desperately poor from an Oxford perspective. Perhaps more alarming was the total loss of confidence after the first goal. The passing football halted, the pressure never relieved and the attacking threat vanished.

Sky Sports' commentator ended his commentary with these words: