So what exactly has Chris Wilder done for the Yellows

We're in that part of the season, and in that kind of form where even a Tuesday night trip to Accrington comes with the complete expectation of a comfortable win. Not a hopeful win, not that we'll be happy with a draw, a win is expected and demanded. Which is precisely what we did, of course.

Living up to expectations is a novelty for us. The efficient execution of a plan; the sure fire sign of success, is something that we haven't been able to do for years. I remember not so long ago, listening to the radio and the presenters speculating that back-to-back home wins would make a difference to whichever season it was. We'd subsequently go and drop points citing the pressure. Now, if we expect three points, we get three points. Not always, but often.

Two defeats in 20 is form that other teams have, not us, but it was not that long ago someone on the radio was saying that Chris Wilder had done nothing for the club this season. It was absurd then, of course, but what are those people thinking now?

When Chris Wilder first arrived at the Kassam, what kind of objectives might we have set for him? Promotion from the football league? For sure. And that was achieved. Year on year progress in the league? That was achieved. Beat your biggest rivals? Well, yes, twice. What about; that we should win our big games - not an easy one to quantify, but we've played 8 games under Wilder in front of more than 10,000 fans and won 5.

One defeat was the West Ham League Cup tie which we lost in the last minute to a goal from the soon to be Footballer of the Year and now England captain. Another was Northwich in the last game of the 2008/9 season, which was a crazy time with a crazy team. Only the 5-0 reverse to Bradford last season, you could argue, was a true failure to perform on the bigger stages. In short, we do well in big games. In addition, you have to be in it to win it; it's taken Chris Wilder 3.5 years to put us in front of 8 10k+ crowds - half the time it took to play 8 10k games before that. And during those 8 games we lost 7; the win against Swindon in the Cup.

What might Chris Wilder have achieved? He could have got us up as champions from the Conference, he could have got us out of League 2 at the first attempt, and he might have found a sustainable striking solution rather than rely on James Constable. With a bit more application in a couple of home games, we could be scrapping toe-for-toe with Swindon for the title. You might also argue that he should have kept Dannie Bulman. But these would have simply polished a comparatively golden period. The Conference championship would have been deeply satisfying, but it would have been at the expense of the adrenaline rush of Wembley. I'm happy to have lived through these blips, to have experienced all the highs of the Wilder-era.

Those who criticise Wilder dissolve into the background at times like this; but they are like sleeper cells. There is a chance that we will hit difficulties in the future. Life in League 1 - which appears to be in our future, maybe this year, maybe next - will be a very different proposition again. We may find ourselves in a relegation battle. This is the perfect opportunity for the sleeper cells to return to 'tell us so'. They will claim they were right all along. Chris Wilder is limited and has done nothing for this club.

Apologists will argue that they have a right to criticise, it is their club and they will be around long after Wilder has gone. Plus, they've paid for their tickets - they're customers. These things are true, but if you are indeed a fan in it for the long term; why are you looking for such a short term fix? If you are just a 'customer', then use your prerogative and walk away. If central values of being a fan are loyalty and longevity; people with half an ounce of decency will bestow a little of that on Chris Wilder as he takes us forward.

Doin' the Duberry

In rare idle moments, I've thought about setting up an automated Twitter account that tweets 'Massive game today' and 'Massive 3 points' every Saturday. This seems to be the standard proclamation of many fans each weekend.

I've learnt that defeats are rarely terminal nor are victories a sign of perpetual forward motion. Typically by about Wednesday the previous week's game is forgotten and you're looking forward to a good performance and a win. Your previous exhalations about the season being over are some way behind you.

That said, Saturday's game against Cheltenham felt pivotal to the destiny of the season. Perhaps it was the spring sun, heralding the ending chapter of the season. The proximity to the Easter programme. The fact that we'd definitively move up a place with a win. Whatever it was, there was a surge of expectation surrounding the fixture after two very encouraging results against Rotherham and Wimbledon.

The feeling was that the Cheltenham game could help define where we were going to end up. It didn't, as it happens, but the games and points keep ticking away, which is good. The reality is that we're likely to end up in a play-off place. Five points behind last year's points total with 8 games to play. This is good progress. From just outside the play-offs last year, to just inside this year is to be celebrated regardless of whether it ends up with League 1 football or not.

Pivotal to the shift, has been Michael Duberry and his omission on Saturday was considered a big blow. At the end of last season it was evident we were naive at the back and the introduction of Capaldi, Whing and Duberry was a clear signal of intent to change that facet of our game. Capaldi, of course, we haven't yet seen. Whing has grown into his role as a utility man and Duberry has truly lived up to his billing.

Not that it's been plain sailing; after the Macclesfield game, where Duberry contrived to score his third own goal of the season, a bloke behind me shouted; 'If someone else made as many mistakes as Duberry, they'd be hammered for it'.

A bit harsh. He is clearly a one of the best defenders in the division, his own goals have been as much about being the man on the spot trying to clear the ball as a sign of incompetence. Failure is not to score an own goal, but to not be around to prevent a goal from happening - as one of Jim Smith's famous motivational signs from the 80's sort of, but not quite, said. Things he can't change - his age and size - play against him robbing him of a degree of pace and agility, but all in all he's been a dominant presence in the back four all year.

There is something else. Duberry is, perhaps, the most famous player in the division. He brings a Premier League pedigree you rarely see. Normally players who have played at the top level have long given up by the time they've reached Duberry's age. He may actually be the last player in English football history to play in League 2 and the Champions League.

As such, he brings experience from the very top of the game. He therefore commands a certain respect. It means he gets away with more than those around him. If Duberry dumps someone to the floor, he'll stand over him, holding out his hands out in an exasperated fashion as if to say 'What's he doing, is this really what the game has come to?'. If there's a nasty tackle, he'll be one of the first wagging his finger telling the player off. The referee, more often than not, agrees.

The referee's role, you see, is to uphold its established values and rules. Duberry positions himself not as one of the low-life playing scum, but as similar 'holder of the flame' to the officials. Constable, you'll see bickering with the referee like a petualent child, Duberry, on the other hand, acts with all experience and world-weariness of a parent - which is fundamentally the same role as a referee.

With Duberry taking the morale high ground the referee has no option but to agree to maintain his position as an establishment figure. If a decision goes against him, he'll wave it away as if to say that the referee doesn't know what he's talking about. And he can do that with some credibility as he was playing top flight football a decade before even the top referee in the UK; Howard Webb. In the sea of anonymity that is League 2; Duberry is a monument, an institution. Referees feel the urge to align themselves with him because he's been where they want to be - in the elite. He doesn't do anything wrong; but just makes it difficult for the referee to remain wholly objective.

I call it doing a 'Duberry' - which is not to be confused with the exact same thing happening to you. If you're on the receiving end of a player using their reputation to manipulate the officials, then it has a very different name. After the masterful way he managed, in a 60 second period, to persuade the referee to send-off Paul Tait and then create such incandescence within the Oxford defence that they conceded the goal that lost the game; when it happens to you it's called a 'Jemson'.

Sometimes football just gets in the way

I've had a few goes at writing the opening to this post, so let's get straight to the point: Why did we do a minute's applause for Fabrice Muamba before Tuesday's game against Wimbledon?

It turns out that I'm not the only one who found it an odd spectacle. We all stood dutifully and participated when told to by Peter Rhodes-Brown. Eventually someone suggested on Twitter that he found it uncomfortable it wasn't long before others came out blinking into the sunlight, like hiding refugees after a military junta had been overthrown.

Years ago minute silences were rare, perhaps no more than one a year. They resulted from the passing of a genuine legend of the club and, as a result, were often disrupted by disinterested away fans. During the early 90s, the phrase 'impeccably observed' began to appear in the football lexicon. It was considered a mark of football's renaissance; its new found humanity.

It really jumped the shark in 2002 when fans were expected to observe a moment's contemplation in respect for the Soham murders. I was on holiday as the tragedy unfolded, the detachment that offered made me question why it was happening. The only link it seemed to have to football was that the girls were wearing Manchester United shirts when they went missing.

It wasn't the first non-football silence. A year earlier, we'd marked 9/11 before a gutless home defeat to Macclesfield. But the world seemed to have tipped on its axis and so it was deemed an acceptable diversion. The death of George Best in 2005 introduced a more celebratory mood with the minute's applause.

Now, however, almost every Very Bad Thing (VBT) demands a moment of collective expression. Tuesday night was new because, well, Fabrice Muamba isn't dead. It's no hardship to participate in a minute's applause, of course, but this does seem to have become the stock response of the emotionally stunted. It seems we can't be trusted to find an appropriate, personal, private response to VBTs. Fabrice Muamba's case is shocking in that you don't expect healthy 23 year-olds to have near fatal heart attacks, but why do we need to a minute's applause to support him? Why would anyone not support a young family man struck down like this?

Henry Winter, on the radio, claimed it was because Muamba is a role model profession with a exceptional back-story. It seems that he is the antithesis of what is typically considered to be the professional football stereotype. However, to say that the applause was specific to Muamba possibly overstates just how much interest people really have in Premier League sub-plots. When it was first reported, I thought they meant Christian Samba. Although it turns out he was a goalkeeper in the Republic of Congo and in fact I was thinking about Christopher Samba. Who, apparently, doesn't even play in England at the moment.

No, we did the round of applause because it was what we were told to do. If Muamba was an average-Joe who'd collapsed in Tesco, nobody would have felt the urge for a public outpouring. And yet it is no less tragic or shocking. This is something not specific to an ill young man, but specific to football. Football simply won't allow a normal response to these incidences. It has acquired almost magical healing powers - it is no longer a game, but a collective spiritual force delivered through the rather sinister sounding 'football family'. In a passive aggressive response, we piously 'put football into perspective' by relegating its importance at times like this. As though any rational thinking human being considers a life to have less importance than football, or, indeed, whether there is any need or point to run a league table of such things. There is a kind of 'look-at-me' thing, look at how much we care, which is specific to football. I would love to blame corporate greed or the Premier League, but I think we've been sleepwalking into it for years.

Owen Coyle and Kevin Davies have both acted impeccably in trying to create some space around Muamba's story. Coyle has been at pains to stress the importance of looking at this from a dispassionate medical stance. The fact Muamba is still alive is remarkable, but we shouldn't get too carried away with ideas that this is a miracle which will see him spring from his bed and dribble a ball into the street. This isn't Roy of the Rovers.

Davies was questioned on whether the quarter-final against Spurs would be replayed. Like we'd slipped back into the idea that the world is just one big league title; 'Kevin, big game for Life on Saturday, can we expect Football to hit back and regain top spot soon?'. Davies, quite rightly, but more importantly, quite normally, disassociated the football talk as irrelevant. One of his mate's has been taken ill, and before he does anything else, he wants him to recover.

The frequency with which the minute's silence is now observed, and now the almost limitless range of VBTs to inlude QBTs (Quite Bad Things) and NVBTs (Not Very Bad Things) that it is apparently appropriate to observe it masks that this, above all, was a triumph of medical science. By all means wish him well and hope for a speedy recovery, but don't applaud Fabrice Muamba, save the NHS.

The curious case of Asa Hall

When Chris Wilder signs two players from the same club - Adam Chapman and Shane Killock, wee Stevie Kinninburgh and wee Ross Perry - the first things you think is; 'who does he want and who's carrying the bags?'.

When Wilder signed Simon Heslop and Asa Hall in 2010 there was a similar feeling. Nearly two years later, it's still difficult to know which is which.

Signed almost immediately after promotion, it's conceivable that the duo would have joined whichever division we were in. Their signing was entirely consistent with Wilder's acquisition strategy in the Conference - mopping up the best available from failing Conference sides (Jack Midson, Ryan Clarke, Mark Creighton, Damian Batt, Simon Clist et al).

Heslop made an early impression in a 'Gerrard' role; bombing forward and pitching in with some spectacular goals. Hall's contribution was less obvious. With Dannie Bulman leaving and Simon Clist sidelined through injury, things weren't quite firing on all cylinders. Wilder continued to mix his midfield pot throughout the season and the duo drifted into the margins. However, where others found themselves ejected on loan and beyond, Heslop and Hall periodically returned throughout the campaign.

Without making midfielders sound like one dimensional Spice Girls, Wilder's preferred three man midfield works best when you've got The Tackling One (Bulman), The Creative One (Murray) and The One Who Does the Housework (Clist). A two-man midfield is more like a bachelor pad - one gets the beers in (Whing, perhaps), one pulls the chicks (Leven) - nobody clears up the pizza boxes and cans of lager.

Hall does none of these, he's not particularly ferocious in the tackle and seems too gangly and untidy to be a creative drive or housemaid. However, Chris Wilder has persevered and he's hit a rich vein of form with fine goals against both Swindon and, again, on Saturday against Rotherham.

Wilder said after the Swindon game that there was a lot more to come from Hall, but he's not known for his patience with players. What is it that Wilder sees in Asa Hall?

Gothic synth monsters Depeche Mode were never going to have a standard vocals, guitar, bass and drums line-up. At their mid-90s peak their 'team' dynamic consisted of Dave Gahan (vocals), Martin Gore (songwriter), Alan Wilder (musician) and Andy Fletcher. Fletch was in all the videos, band pictures, and appeared on stage. When their rock-myth was most rampant he was attributed with playing 'bass synth', as if such a thing existed. As the fan base matured and their own lives mellowed, the veil was allowed to fall; it became clear that Fletch was, effectively, the band's accountant. In short, his role wasn't to add any rock-god musical magic, but to provide a stable base that secured the band long term.

Asa Hall is apparently good friends with James Constable. Constable comes across as an intelligent guy who benefits from having a stable background of family and friends he can rely on. If Constable is drawn to people like himself, then Hall's success can be explained simply by the fact he's a good guy to have about the place.

Very late in Saturday's game, as Rotherham prepared one last assault to try and grab an undeserved point, Michael Duberry and Adam Chapman engaged in an agitated argument about who was picking up their extra players. Neither would back down - Chapman, an ebullient character despite his age, was adamant that players needed picking up, Duberry, similarly dominant, waved him away aggressively. Neither would back down. If you add people like Peter Leven, Andy Whing and James Constable it is clear that as the squad improves, the characters become stronger. With this comes greater risk of it destabilising through its own forceful personality. Hall's role becomes more essential because he is there to be do whatever is needed and improve his team and surroundings. With Leven and Chapman at his side, Hall's apparent anonymity and quiet improvement becomes their key to success.

That, or it's just his new haircut, of course.

An open letter to Swindon Town

Dear Swindon Town
Firstly, sorry for writing to you en masse like this but I feel it’s time we talked.

Let’s be honest, it’s been a good season for both of us. You are set to win the league and we are continuing our steady recovery from a decade of neglect with real potential for clinching a play-off spot. I guess we had hoped to be higher, but objectively, we’re pretty happy with where we are at the moment. Something you learn when you’re in the doldrums is to keep life in perspective. Who knows, this time next year we could both be in League 1? Wouldn’t that be nice?

Now, I don’t have a massive problem with you to be honest. For example, I quite like your manager. I don’t agree with his politics, but I’m assuming that he’s not actively ethnic cleansing anyone at the moment and a man is more complex than his ideological persuasion. He’s charismatic and funny. I like listening to his interviews. He plays a great villain with his sun glasses and histrionics and all that scarf waving.

I have to say, I feel uncomfortable addressing you as one, like you're all the same. You're not all bad. The Washbag, the Swindon blog, has got to be amongst the best on the web. It’s coverage of the derby was first class; intelligently partisan. You should read it, support it and encourage its progress.

And congratulations on Matt Ritchie, by the way. He’s clearly quite a good player. His performance at the Kassam was completely overshadowed by his assault on our ball boy, of course. But he was magnanimous enough to apologise after the final whistle and it was all a bit in the heat of the moment.

We’re pleased to have kept James Constable, he means a lot to us. Be honest, you wanted him. You don’t make three bids and spout lies and nonsense in the press, like your manager did, if you don't want a player. He didn’t want to go. Because if he wanted to go, he’d have gone. Footballers and clubs are very good at making deals happen if they want them to. And it didn’t happen. If you’re right, however, and Di Canio did pull out due to Constable's hesitation, you might want to ask why your manager is prepared to risk your club's money on whimsical big money bids. Believe me, that’s just not healthy; the man has a rampant ego, you might want to watch that. Please stop pretending that you didn’t want Constable and that he wanted to come. It’s just not doing you any good.

And while we’re at it, let’s just keep the Lee Holmes thing in perspective. This isn’t Mo Johnston breaching a century-old religious divide moving from Celtic to Rangers. We signed Lee briefly on loan. He did pretty well for us, including two lovely crosses for the goals in the derby. He has decided to come to you. Surely you don't believe that he's moved for anything other than business reasons. He might help you win the title but, you were already going to win that anyway. He hasn't moved to spite us, he’s moved so that he can gad around as a ‘title winner’ in May and, I suspect, because Southampton got a better financial deal out of your lot. So you're spending more money on a player you don't need. I don't know, perhaps you can afford it, but why are you stockpiling expensive players?

We’ll ignore Mehdi Kerrouche, whose move has been largely inconsequential. He didn’t really ‘do it’ for us, and I suspect he’ll now rot in the reserve for you. No gain there.

Now, let’s deal with one of those portentous phrases you keep using; ‘Forever in our shadow’. Am I right to assume this is some sort of analogy to illustrate how we’re supposedly cowering from your luminous glory? Let’s be honest, neither of us can really claim any great glory in our recent history. We enjoy our clubs and what they stand for, and we enjoy our successes when they happen. But your glories are not so bright as to cast a significant shadow over anyone.

Sorry, you’re just not that important. There's nothing for us to be jealous of. In two years time, no one will remember your League 2 title. I’m sorry, they won’t. Don’t get me wrong, I would love for us to win a title, that will be very important to me and my club. But I don't expect it to cast a shadow over anyone else, including you. And just because we're not winning the title doesn’t mean I'm bothered that you are. Your self importance is a bit bewildering and somewhat overstated. You just don’t cast a shadow over us, or anyone (nor do we, but then we don't claim to). I go to games all the time and, honestly, nobody is talking about you. We're too busy talking about us. Which is just how it should be.

And then there’s this whole ‘our cup final’ thing about the actual derby games. It seems to me that you make a a lot of noise about everything to do with Oxford and Swindon except the actual games. I guess that’s because we won both of them this season. It’s still quite odd that you don’t seem to even acknowledge them. I have to say I enjoyed the games immensely this year, particularly the home game, which was epic in every sense from the setting to the nature of our win. And, of course, you played your part magnificently. You surely have to recognise that it was dramatic, even though the result wasn’t one you were looking for.

And what about your claims around our imminent financial meltdown? Where has that come from? Your insults would have more resonance if they had some credibility, perhaps some wit. Instead, you guess and lie and believe stuff that satisfies this odd fantasy that you've created in your head. It makes you a bit daft.

You see, Swindon Town, my problem is that we’ve played our games and we’ve moved on. The more you badger on about signing Lee Holmes, or your youth team victories, or beating Dagenham or the fact you’re top of the league, or the shadow you cast, or that you have four stands or the way you put #oufc in your tweets about things which are only vaguely related to us, leads me to but one thought.

I don’t care.

Really, I don’t care.

Seasons are better when we’re together; we’re good for each other because it gives us something to look forward to. Big games are really fun, much better than run-of-the-mill games against anyone else. But the excitement, our rivalry, is about the games. Nothing else. I don’t care about your grandstanding, I don’t care about your league position, I don’t care about your decidedly average achievements, I don’t care about your players, even if they’ve played for us in the past. I have children and a job and a house to renovate, and a blog to write. I don't really have much time to care about you. I just don't. And yet, there you are, going on and on and on about how wonderful you are. Your not going to convince me, and if I'm not listening, then you're talking to yourself. That way madness lies.

I do think your manager is funny, he makes me laugh and I think he's actually added to the drama this year. I’m pretty sure that he doesn’t have the mental stability, loyalty or ability to take you much beyond where you are. But he’s done well and he’s your problem.

You're going for the title, we're going for the play-offs. We have different objectives. Your only influence on us now is if you take points off teams around us. If you beat them, which I’m sure you want to, then we’d be very grateful. Perhaps you’ll deliberately lose to them to spite us, but that would be silly. Then again, given that the rivalry appears to centre on everything else BUT the actual games we play against each other, perhaps you will.

Your obsession with us is worrying, you might need help. Is your team not enough for you? Really, we’re flattered by your attention, it’s sweet, but it's getting a little creepy. You expend so much energy talking about us, I'm beginning to think, well, you really love us. If you didn't like us, you'd go and do something else, but you don't. I do suggest you find a hobby or something to fill up the time you currently spend thinking about us, because you're lovely, but you're not really my type, thanks.

So, turn around, walk away. Enjoy your season and your club. Clubs like ours don't enjoy success very often, so you should savour it while you can. I'm sure we'll meet again, and we can renew the argument about who is best on the pitch. In the meantime, I hope you're happy in all you do.

Lots of love
Oxblogger

Still going up?

After the derby last week I walked the children into town to spend their World Book Day vouchers. The adrenaline was still pumping, my brain still processing the sights, sounds and experiences of the last few hours. The weather was spring-like with a slight chill cutting through the warm sun. People around me were getting on with their normal Saturday afternoons. It was a quiet weekend in an Oxfordshire market town.

It reminded me of Cup Finals during my childhood. It was the only domestic club game shown live on TV. The television would go on at 8am for a cup final themed Swap Shop or Saturday Superstore, then we'd flick between Grandstand on BBC and World of Sport on ITV, depending the celebrity-strewn line-up each was offering. There were things that I thought were unique to the Cup Final - hotels, team coaches, suits, the ritualistic inspection of the pitch, flags - nobody had flags at games unless it was the Cup Final. I remember the 1984 Cup Final coverage opening with shots of Andy Gray and Mick Lyons, topless, hanging out of their hotels smiling and laughing. I realise now that there were probably hookers, lager and cigarettes just out of shot. But for me, this was a simple football celebration.

The game would happen - and then my mum would turf me out into the street. I was full of fizzy pop and sugar and hydrogenated fats, exhausted from my sedentary day, overloaded with the noise and epicness of the coverage. there would be an early evening chill in the air, and a quiet void as my head span. I loved Cup Finals.

'Our Cup Final' The withering solipsism of the moronic Swindon fringe. If a cup final is a big game you're desperate to win, then yes, indeed last Saturday had all the hallmarks of a cup final. It isn't our only focus or necessarily our biggest game, it seems that in modern football not winning is actually cooler than winning. Teams forgo winning 'cups', or in this case, derbies, for apparently bigger prizes (5th place in the Premier League or the vague hope of group elimination in the Champions League). Some Swindon fans appear to have dismissed last week's derby because their focus is the league. Last time I looked, winning games was integral to winning leagues. If their focus is the title, I still can't quite fathom how losing to Oxford helped their chances. Still, if they wish to by-pass the fun of actually playing in big games to attain a position within the League they're barely able to attain, and incapable of sustaining, then so be it.

Ian Lenegan's post-match interview against Swindon talked of gentle, sustainable growth, with the aim of reaching the Championship. Beating Swindon isn't the reason for his investment; but he'll enjoy the journey as much as the ultimate destination. And so should we. And so should they.

But the reasons that made last Saturday so special - triumph in the face of significant on-pitch adversity - was likely to bite us on the arse eventually. Unlike most 'cup finals' there is no recovery period afterwards, and so no rest-bite to our injury crisis. Perhaps Tuesday's excellent draw with Shrewsbury was the benefit of momentum but Saturday was a game too far. Perhaps we've forgotten that we're still playing with a patched up team. 'Struggling' Bradford have not lost at home since November, and so despite their supposed lowly position, it was never going to be a push over.

Our own form is both good and bad, depending on predisposition. Miserablists will look at four wins in 12 during 2012 and too many draws. Chirpy-heads will look at two defeats in the same time and nearly 4 months without an away defeat up until Saturday. The reality is that we are 16 points ahead of where we were this time last year and we've been sitting in the play-off places for some weeks. Teams in a similar position, of which there a few, are similarly undulating. Swindon are in a stellar run, which is a reference point that doesn't help the doomongers finding 'proof' of our supposed failings. In reality, their existence is really only relevant during the 180 minutes the clubs spend in each others' company. Although perhaps not for the Swindon tweeter who last week tweeted their youth team victory over United with the hashtag #priderestored. Ah, bless.

Two years ago we'd just been beaten by Hayes and Yeading at home, now we're in the League 2 play-off places 16 points better off than we were last year. We have a decent chance at the play-offs and should we make it, will be able to go into it relaxed in the knowledge that whatever is achieved is on an upward trajectory (even if Swindon do end up as champions, it still be lower than they were last year and a third year of decline). The knowledge we can beat the best in the division home and away, should offer some confidence that we can go up this season, even if it is by a narrower margin than we would hope. Promotion would be a lot of fun, and this season has already delivered two truly memorable chunks of fun already. If we don't get promotion, that doesn't mean we're failing. Going up, however, will need people to keep some perspective in the coming weeks.

Why we should welcome Adam Chapman

Adam Chapman returned to the starting line-up for last night's 2-2 draw with Shrewsbury following an impressive display against Swindon. Some will say that he should never have been given the opportunity. I think they're wrong.

For an insight into professional sport you could do a lot worse than reading David Millar’s Riding through the Dark. Millar is perhaps the most naturally gifted cyclist this country has produced in a generation. Developed almost completely outside the gold medal factory run by Dave Brailsford at British Cycling, Millar rose from local racing amateur to world time-trial champion.

In the process he evolved from wide-eyed romantic to cynical professional. Eventually, he was busted for doping in 2004, served a 2 year ban, but has since returned to become a leading voice in the fight against drugs in sport.

His drug taking wasn’t ‘evil’ or cheating a system, as he saw it at the time. It was widely sanctioned and accepted within his sport. He was fulfilling an obligation to sponsors, team owners, the media, race organisers and even fans. If he was seen failing, or not competing because of tiredness or injury, then he wasn’t fulfilling his professional obligation. He could sustain his performances with drugs and because everyone else was doing it too, it was just all part of the business they don't call 'show'.

This, he now realises, is a pointless and facile crusade. As much as people want to watch and enjoy sport, they don’t want to be thinking about the drugs that are making it happen. If the Corinthian spirit isn’t in some way evident, sport is a waste of time. We want to see people struggling to achieve, achieving without struggle is boring.

But professional sport, he says, does not do rehabilitation. It’s a world in which coming second is considered first loser, it has no mechanism for helping people recover from failure or triumph over adversity; whether than be illness or injury, cheating, or in Adam Chapman’s case, killing a man.

If sport has a compelling narrative it is triumph over adversity. That is why Manchester City and Chelsea are so utterly tedious; they’ve bypassed adversity with their money. Conversely; Lance Armstrong would have been forgotten had he been a Texan gobshite who got cancer and just died without winning 7 Tour de France titles. Both sides of the struggle/success equation are needed in order to make sport worthwhile.

Oxford should be applauded for keeping Adam Chapman on the books and accepting him back into the club following his release from jail. This isn’t a hero’s welcome, although inevitably some will treat it as such; there is no heroism in what he’s done. However, it gives him a platform to rehabilitate. After the Swindon win, Kelvin Thomas talked about Chapman as 'looking like a man out there'. Which is the whole point of rehabilitation. Time will tell, but there are good signs that he's grown up and come back a more mature professional.

It will be interesting to see if Michael Duberry has any influence over Chapman as someone else who has triumphed over adversity. Another rehabilitated yellow; Billy Turley, provided essential support for him in the run up to his trial. If Chapman comes back, does well and goes on to have a great career, he has not 'got away with' what he’s done, he has shown people a path that many don’t believe is there. Without rehabilitation the only route available is a desceding loop of crime which narrows what is considered to be achievable. The club’s support of Chapman allows a story of redemption to play itself out, and that’s got to be better than throwing him on the slag heap.

7 step guide to winning a derby

There have been better performances and bigger results, but has there ever been a better story behind a game of football involving Oxford United?

Your dad will tell you stories of past games involving mythical beasts and feats of derring-do. You'll listen in awe when you're young, but as you get older, you'll begin to question how close to the facts the story actually is.

Saturday's game is the story you tell your children and grandchildren. And you won't have to make up a word of it.

But how, playing the best team in the league, in the richest vein of form in their history, with a team stripped of most of our best players, did we actually win on Saturday? Here's Oxblogger's 7 step guide to our derby victory.

Fascism
Paolo is a fascist. Fact. A cheap shot?

No, fascism is an ideology promoting unity through hard work and intolerance of non-compliance. Di Canio's leadership philosophy inevitably draws on his deep-seated principles. After our win at the County Ground he admitted an admirable need to learn from the experience. His public spat with Leon Clarke earlier in the season resulted from Clarke's reluctance to put in the work Di Canio demanded. Work and continuous improvement are basic principles of fascism. You won't get many fans resisting calls for unity and hard work from their manager; you don't have to be a fascist to be intoxicated by that dogma if you find success.

However, extreme ideologies assume stability, they promote a single path to a single destination. They assume unquestionably, that the path and destination are pre-determined. Their intolerant response to uncertainty is to reinstate the ideology through force, that is plan B. Compliance can justifiably be achieved through violence, if you're a fascist. When violence isn't an option, and things change, there isn't a plan B.

As we will see, things changed a lot during the build up to, and the course of, the derby.

Swindon's form
A lot was made of Swindon's 10-game winning streak; a club record. Logically, this put them into a strong position going into Saturday's game. But they'd never been in that position before, no manager in their history had been in that position before. The longer any record breaking run goes on the more likely it is to end. Each game brings new pressures that have never been experienced, by anyone, before.

The opposition's attitude changes, complacency creeps in, tiredness, mental fatigue. As the challenges get more complicated the central tenet of Di Canio's ideology, hard work, is not the only solution. The last thing you need during a record run is a rabid derby atmosphere introducing more variables. At their peak when they were apparently at their strongest, Swindon were increasingly vulnerable.

Peter Leven's injury
Peter Leven has become a focal point of a lot of what we do. He's in a goal of the season competition, he trends on Twitter, he takes all our set pieces, he's a creative spark. Other players look to him, the fans look to him.

The early announcement of his injury last week served to change expectations; we wouldn't win the game playing the Leven way because he wouldn't be there. Without Leven, nobody knew how we'd beat Swindon. Some believed we couldn't win. Di Canio; whose strengths of motivation through application, requires a stable environment, didn't know either. Paradoxically, Leven's injury played into Chris Wilder's hands.

Jake Wright's injury
After the Leven announcement, Jake Wright's injury flew under the radar. Wright's leadership skills are without parallel at Oxford. You rarely see a player so in control of his team. However, he also likes to play football, some of his passing along the back line is hair raising.

Wright's injury allowed Whing to slot into the back-four. That changed the dynamic considerably. Whing is a no-nonsense fighter, he and Duberry set a different tone that spread throughout the team. Anthony Tonkin, lackadaisical in the Conference, suddenly became a ferocious pitbull. The back-four weren't going to play football, they were going to block and clear their lines. The Oxford that we've been watching all season, was not the Oxford that appeared on Saturday.

Swindon fans
They may claim otherwise, but this was a big game. For many of us, our only interaction with the police is getting frustrated when they get stuck in the Tesco self-scan aisle buying a mid-shift chocolate bar. The neutralised zone built around the away end and coach loads of Swindon fans being escorted by a phalanx of police horses fed a frenzied atmosphere. We know that elements of both sides stepped beyond the mark; but overall, it was a fantastic spectacle.

They've got the LDV Autowindscreen Simod Cup Final and the prospect of the title. You can argue until you're blue in the face as to which is most important. But, they won't have a bigger, or more rarefied league game all year. This wasn't conclusive proof that we are best; it was just another chapter in a saga.

In the same way that Celtic need a strong Rangers to thrive, Swindon and Oxford benefit from each others' presence. The derby has defined our season both on and off the pitch. It was only because it was Swindon that things turned out like they did. 

James Constable's sending off
Constable's profile within this fixture had grown some way beyond what he (or anyone) could influence on the pitch. Everyone interprets things beyond what they see. Constable's challenge on Devera was not malicious, it was barely worthy of a yellow card. The referee interpreted the reaction of the Swindon fans, players and the fact it was Constable to conclude that this was an aggressive action from a player who'd been affected by the pressure that surrounded him. Had it been any other player on the pitch, they wouldn't have been sent off.

Constable's departure left Rendell up front on his own. All he had to do was hold the ball when it came to him, he did it magnificently. My man of the match. Di Canio had put so much emphasis on Constable, when he was no longer there, Swindon struggled to know who to worry about. We became a multi-headed beast for about five minutes. Johnson, Holmes and Asa Hall weren't in Di Canio's play book. Oxford, fierce local rivals playing in front of a massive partisan home crowd, were playing like an away team with players Di Canio had never seen before.

He didn't react, he panicked. The situation was different to the one he'd planned. He substituted Cibocchi for Smith, and then Smith for Cox. They kept playing deep balls to the back post in the first half and passed and passed and passed to no great effect in the second. Had we gone at them, they may have picked us off. Had things gone through Leven and Constable, they'd have stifled that because it was too obvious. If we'd played the way we want to play, it wouldn't have been as effective and the crowd would have got frustrated. As the situation changed, Chris Wilder was the one who reacted and the fans recognised the role they had to play. Wembley taught us that victory comes from patience.

Oxford United
Stripped of Wright and Leven plus Davis and Potter. Down to ten men through the loss of our talismanic striker after 10 minutes. With our match winning goalkeeper suffering cramp throughout the second half. Playing the league leaders on a 10 game winning streak in a local derby. The prospect of a draw, let alone a win, was distant to say the least.

They say that you can judge a team by its strength on the substitute's bench - of the 10 players on the pitch; seven wouldn't have been in the team had we played at Christmas. 3 wouldn't have been in the team on Friday. You don't throw those players together in that environment against that side and accidentally beat them.

This was the victory of a deep, cohesive and motivated squad, moulded by Wilder and funded by Thomas, who has created an off-the-pitch set up dedicated to winning games (yes, I mean you East Stand ball boys).

Di Canio's Swindon is a good side, the best technical side we've faced. They weren't as effective or efficient as Cheltenham, but they're still likely champions. However, they are built on a simplistic utilitarian ideology that was exposed on Saturday lunch time because the world is not simple and things change. Yes, we won the derby, yes, we won the double. But more than both of those we demonstrated emphatically what the new Oxford United philosophy is about.

30 years of the Swindon derby - part 5

The first ever FA Cup tie between the sides was shown live on TV. The BBC, constrained by their contract to show games from the early rounds, seemed shocked to discover a game that had purpose and meaning.

The ground was full and noisey, into the cauldron of hate entered an insane warrior with a maniacal look on his face, the tension that had hung over the fixture exploded, spitting its venom across the stadium. Weeks of malice, weeks of fans exchanging abuse, and now this. He sprinted unabated at the Swindon fans shaking his fists? A man hiding behind an allegiance to a football club, kissing the badge on his shirt, hollering his manic ramblings through his beak.

Ronny the rocking Robin was Swindon’s mascot; a six foot three inch robin sprinting around, sliding on his knees, banging on advertising hoardings and leading the away fans’ singing. Quite frankly, he pissed all over Ollie the Ox.

You've got to give them their victories when they deserve them, I suppose.

Three years earlier I’d stood on the terraces at the Manor with chest pains as we narrowly avoided relegation. A year later we shipped 100 goals, were relegated by April and I was shrouded with a simple gloom. I'd been feeding my habit with an evermore dirty, diluted drug. Each time I used it I hoped for one of those old buzzes, each time I was left sullied and unfulfilled.

Ten minutes before  kick-off the air was filled with Two Tribes by Frankie Goes To Hollywood, it was ear splitting. Then they put on some Euro pop and the stadium began to jump, the whole place began to sing, and wave, and dance. The stand shuddered under my feet. That used to happen at the Manor, but that was because it was about to fall down, this was because there was a wall of noise enveloping the whole stadium.

A lump came to my throat.

I'd watched Oxford since I was three, seen them at Wembley, seen them beat Arsenal, Manchester United and Chelsea but in the last four years I'd watched the club die under the weight of crippling debt and piss poor karma. I stood on the terraces seeing the sands of the club's life slip through my fingers. Then, suddenly, it woke up again, and I had no idea how much it meant to me.

We hadn't even kicked off.

We played like an away side, absorbing pressure – although we were top of Division 4 at the time, Swindon were flying high in Division 3. At half time Mark Lawrenson urged Oxford to show some ambition. The game was there for the taking.

We didn’t. Ian Atkins’ teams didn’t do that. We played for territory in the hope that the platform of a set piece might offer an opportunity. Just after the hour mark Scott McNiven lobbed a throw into the box which was flicked on by Jefferson Louis. Steve Basham ghosted across the six yard line, but failed to make contact, the inadvertent feint deceived the Swindon keeper and the ball bounced gently into the bottom left hand corner.

We’d secured another famous win. There was delirium. The 3rd Round draw plucked out an away tie at Arsenal. The team showed their decorum with Louis jumping butt naked through the Oxford dressing room. Characteristically, Atkins responded to the draw with something like ‘I feel like a 5-4-1 coming on’. A joke for the football tactics nerds, which says it all really.

I thought this was the beginning of the big revival. Firoz Kassam had actually got it right. He’d taken a lot of flack getting there, but I began to think that perhaps he was deserving of his success.

But, once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic, it proved a mere moment of sobriety before the grip of our disease tightened once again. The derby was once again packed away, this time for nearly a decade, the longest of hiatus of them all. We headed off to the wilderness, they were stuck in lower-league meaningless.

In 2011 the rivalry roared back, stronger than ever. The parallels with 1996 are evident, both sides entered the season with aspirations of promotion and we had another toy to squabble over. For Beauchamp read James Constable, who Swindon relentlessly, and unsuccessfully, pursued. We won at the County Ground – but I’ve done that to death already.

Which takes us up to Saturday. Over the last 17 years – since the tumult of the 1995/6 promotion season - Oxford have edged the head to head results, whereas Swindon have enjoyed  more overall success, which is not saying much. Which is more important depends on your viewpoint, of course. For me, a derby is all about the head to head, but I would say that.

The derby is in rude health; both sides are on an upward curve and we’ve had a jolly good squabble over James Constable, which will surely be a focal point of Saturday’s fixture. We’re losing key players hand over fist and Paolo DiCanio offers an angle to the disinterested media. It augers well for an absolute ripsnorter.

30 years of the Swindon derby - part 4

After the turbulence surrounding Joey Beauchamp’s movement between the two clubs and the 1995/6 promotion race, the derby settled into an era of stability.

There was new spice injected into the fixture, helped by Beauchamp’s ever presence in the Oxford team over that period, but it wasn't a shadow of what had gone before.

Between 1996 and 2000 each of the next 7 meetings ended in home wins. It was like the sports/entertainment hybrids of 6 day track cycling or WWE wrestling where a feisty and exciting affair always concluded with a win for the local favourite.

Although the outcomes were becoming predictable, the sequence cemented both sides’ perception of Beauchamp and therefore each other. Most Oxford fans watched him on the winning side; most Swindon fans watched him on the losing side. Was Beauchamp a winner or a loser? From the evidence in front of them, the views of both sets of fans were right.

Neither side were good enough to go up nor bad enough to go down, but behind the scenes, Oxford were beginning to fall apart. Like an alcoholic who starts drinking in the pub and then on his own, and then, almost without realising, he’s suddenly downing a skin full of whiskey for breakfast.

The sequence of home wins was broken in 2001 in what was a wretched season. We'd lost at the County Ground in a game which was a complete shambles – illustrated most famously by Guy Whittingham’s one and only goal scoring appearance for Oxford. Five months later Swindon came to the Manor and took all 3 points back to Wiltshire. Not that we cared too much. By this point we were lying in a pool of our own vomit with piss stains on our trousers. Winning derbies, playing any kind of football, was a meaningless aside.

A fresh start – and a move to the Kassam Stadium – saw little improvement. The anticipated surging return never came. Firoz Kassam scrabbled to arrest the slide and happened upon Ian Atkins, who was able to administer cold dose of reality that seemed to straighten us up.

The move had instant impact and by 2002 we were challenging for promotion again. It wasn’t pretty, but it was effective. It was the perfect time to renew our acquaintance with those from Down-the-really-tedious-and-impossible-to-overtake-A-road-to-hell.

Next... the end.