Thetownend.com

I keep reading on here quotes such as "early days" "we will still piss this league" and "see who is laughing on the last day of the season"
Well heres a few questions,do you realistically think you can win this league?
Is a top 3 finish well within your capabilities?
After the start you have had would you take a play off place now?

From an Oxford perspective,
I think Crawley will walk this league,they have kept there momentum going and spent big.
I think a top 3 is a poss,but will be difficult,lucky results like yesterday are essential.
Would probably take a play off place now,but as 7th is a play off spot,this should be the minimum.

I think Swindon will struggle against teams that come for a draw,but will do well against the teams that try to play football.

Shrewsbury away could be the acid test for your team,they play football,will come at you,and in doing so,give you more space,a win could be the kick start you need.
Current odds for Division 2.
http://www.bet365.com/home/FlashGen4/WebConsoleApp.asp
Your out to 18/1,so if you still think you will"piss this league" lump on.
But the bookies are rarely wrong and Crawley are 13/8 !!

Why do you care what our ambitions are?

Fuck off back to your own forum.

126 points left to play for.

Do I think we can win the league? Is a mighty big ask to be honest.

However, I do think we can finish in the top three.

My ambition pre season was not to endure a fuck up failure like last season rather than vying for honours.........its not going too well at the mo...

It's going to take time but once we click we will start climbing the league, We were far better than your lot yesterday who got lucky with two set pieces and other than that you were no threat to us whatsoever, 4 out of 46 games is a bit to early for predictions but i would expect us to be in the top 3 come the end of the season and the play offs at worst.

18/1 is cracking E/W odds and well worth a punt.

Why do you care what our ambitions are?

Fuck off back to your own forum

Nice of you to enter the debate.
Welshred,hmm,shouldnt you be on the Wrexham forum?

I just don't understand why on earth you care about what our ambitions for the season are? I couldn't care any less what your lots hopes and ambitions are for the season, and nipping over to ask you all hasn't even entered my mind. Why would I care?! I have absolutely no desire to converse with Oxford United fans.

Why do you care?

Its a forum,
An Internet forum, or message board, is an online discussion site where people can hold conversations in the form of posted messages.
If everybody on this and any forum,had the same opinion it would be boring and nobody would be on it.
I havent been derogatory about Swindon,i admitted that Oxford were fortunate yesterday,i just wondered what the opinion
was,from sensible posters,what there realistic ambitions for the season were.
You say you dont give a fuck about what i,or any Oxford fans think,  really, so why are you posting on my thread?
 

The problem is thememoriesgone, the level of obsession that you have with us is grating on Swindon fans at the moment. This isn't sour grapes because it's been mentioned several times before yesterdays game.

Now would be about the normal time to be on a rivals forum so it's probably not directed at you personally but the sheer level of oxford fans on our forum not only in the build up to this game but just generally, we find very odd. Yes we are biggest rivals and the feeling is mutual but a lot of people are getting the impression supporting oxford is as much about Swindon losing as it is Oxford doing well.

The sheer level of obsession to the point where the Oxford Mail has a headline on the back page that the "SWINDON CHELTENHAM IS ON!" is really quite strange and very backwards. It's difficult to get our heads round as apart from the songs we have which are fun to sing(I would also say cheering the half time score when you're losing, but we haven't been in the same leage...whats the bet they still announce it at the Kassam when we're losing in a higher league?), we really haven't thought that much about you for 9 years until the prospect of playing you has come up. Certainly not enough to visit a rival forum regularly.

To be blunt, it's fucking odd.

Jesus wept, the guy wasn't being antagonising or anything.

I know generally this forum is reserved for discussions such as whether Broccoli is an aphrodisiac for ducks, however

Intelligent football debate is severely lacking on here at the best of times!

I've said along that as long as we secure top 3 then that's all that matters and I still think we are capable of doing so.

At least you admit you were luck yesterday. More displays like that will see us win more than we lose, that much I am confident of.
Can see what you're saying about breaking teams down that come for a point. But we have the physicality to sort that out, if Paolo picks the right team.
I have every confidence that we'll have a good season.
Unfortunately it does seem like Crawley are going to be contenders - judging by these early results.

I know he wasn't being antagonising, but I just struggle to understand why he feels the need to ask about our current ambitions?

Do you care about what Oxford fans expect for the rest of the season? No. You don't.

I suppose I'm just surprised to see the level of obsession that they seem to have with us.

I was listening to TalkSport on the way home yesterday (was out with the family) and he was talking (ranting) about their win. "We.....Beat....Them....", "Its the best day....ever".

I mean, come on. Get things into perspective will you?

I like a bit of a debate, especially with Pox fans, they gloat at our inability to beat them but this bloke/woman has not come on here purely to gloat about yesterday (which is to be expected) they have actually started off in a fairly open debate.

As Eric did.....things will probably change for the worse soon enough though as a lot of our fans goad back and then it develops into a free for all...sigh.

I'd like to think that come the end of september we'll be generally injury free, playing a settled squad and things will begin to click. If that happens I think we've got the quality in the squad to be challenging at the right end of the table.

If it doesn't, we'll plod around mid table, rarely being outclassed but conceding sloppy goals. Like yesterday.

Generally this is an optimistic forum, so would have thought the majority view on here would be that everything will turn out hunky dory.

I think in reality you are disappointed not to come onto this forum and read about how our fans are crying into our beer and slitting our wrists because we lost to Oxford.. and it hasn't happened.

This is a decent forum and some of the postings on here have been absolutely spot on. Most on here are realistic and whilst I don't think any of us believe that we will "piss this league" as you put it, we have taken positives from yesterday and most still think that making the playoffs is not impossible.

I certainly don't mind other fans of other clubs coming on here now and again for a bit of healthy (not idiotic) banter/pre match build up.

Sadly, far too many mongs have been let in recently - not sure who's responsible for that but it upsets the whole dynamic.  Posters like Oxford Fan are good value but some of the new posters have sadly only managed to illustrate the fact that it definitely is still the school holidays.

That is spot on Luci, healthy debate even wth Pox fans is fine, as you say OF seems a good lad, Eric and others start off ok then degenerate into a slanging match.

I think the thing is that how many posts can you give them before they annoy everyone? 1 wind=up post or 2 or 3? or do they have to abuse everyone before they get banned or keep spamming shit.

Losing regularly is a rubbish habit. If we break it and turn the corner, playoffs could still be realistic. I honestly think we could finish anywhere between 1st and 15th!

I'll probaby get labled as negative etc but i think we could have problems. People are rightly behind Di canio, but i am not convinced our team will be up the top fighting for promotion unless significant improvement is made.

We have lost 3 in a row and the team is still being experimented with as it's nowhere near complete. They will have to get it right and quickly.

Agree to some extent, although to me it looks like the experimental stage is coming to a close. After City and Shrewsbury I think we'll see the side begin to settle and hopefully that will bear fruit. I'm still confident we can make the play-offs, and if things really do click then we could push for something better.

If we can learn to defend against set pieces & our stikers get match fit we will still do ok.

One thing with diCanio, we will fight as a team

I think yesterday showed some very promising signs, especially with our attacking play. Caddis, Ritchie and Gabilondo had plenty of trickery on the wings with the ability to open up the full backs. Clarke tired second half but is strong and mobile, can see him being a very handy target man this year. However, Phil Smith's commanding of his area still worries me and Devera was shaky first half (though I thought he settled down after the break).

There are plenty of examples of teams starting slowly before going on excellent runs to gain promotion in recent years. Honestly believe we will be in the top 7 come Easter, and after that it's anyones.

Enouraged by the way we played in the last game and also by, hopefully the latest signing Lukas Magera, but I think the best thing to happen to us will be the closing of the transfer window. Then there will be now more players to experiment with and the players that we have will become match fit as they will be playing more often rather than being dropped for a new sigining. I think a top three place is still on the cards. Individually i think we have a good team, just they need to gell more and become fully match fit.

Losing goals during set plays could be attributed to match fitness as people are switching off and just grabbing a breather rather than staying mentally sharp. I think this will improve pretty much on its own and nothing PDC will do.

As of yesterday our team is nowhere near settled, the regulars are:

Smith
Caddis
Flint
Ritchie

Apart from those 4 it has been a different team every game, how people can expect players to perform as a team when every game they are with a new set of players is beyond me. Yesterday was new team yet again and it will be changed again for City. The only chance we have of reaching a setted team will be Shrewsbury where the same players may have played in the same team for one game.

I think from the Rotherham game we should see some stability with maybe one or two changes per game. We need to go back to the Wilson play-off season where you could name the team and substitutes game after game.

I'm not too bothered how we go up but I fear a top finish is beyond us, too be honest I dont care if we win in the playoffs with an own goal off someones arse, as long as we get out of this graveyard division where the has beens and never will be's reside.

Anything less than top 3 would be abject failure

Yeah, winning the playoff final would be a fucking nightmare.  :suicide:

It depends on how quickly we sort out the spine of the side, who is our first 11 and sort out a consistent style of football.  We appear to be missing a bit of dour faced pragmatic Scotch management and on a pure personal note I believe  Paolo would benefit with having  British number two alongside him with a bit of experience up his wizard’s sleeve.

Anyway, back to the topic on hand.  I think we’ll fanny around until November with chopping and changing the first team, mixed results and then crack into gear around mid-December.   When we do hit gear I think we’ll be smashing a few back doors in but where we finish will depend on the performance of the front runners.  I think we’ll finish second with a decent cup run.

Just to add,  I don’t think Crawley have that much to offer whatsoever.  A few decent journeymen, a couple of players who should be playing at a higher level but nothing several other squads in the league can match.

yeah, never lost at wembley :hmmm:, oh wait

In 06-07, especially after the flying start, think most people expected us to go up....but this season is different, we're starting from a difficult position with a novice manager. Only the loons and  :clap: would expect a top 3 place

Top three will happen in my opinion,not worried one bit at present,the team wont be long in gelling then we will be on our way.

You'll have to put me down as a loon then Reg  8)

I'm a loon too then. As are 95% of people on this forum.  :doh:

Not worried at all. Still very early days. Remember when Hartlepool came up with us in 06/07 they were 13th around December then come the last game they kicked off in 1st place. When we made the play-off final a few seasons back we didn't click until November. You don't have to get off to a great start to get promoted. Yesterday showed we have potential as a team. We just need sharper and fitter strikers and to learn how to defend set plays. Once we have that along with a settled side we're away.

There is of course a difference between hoping for and expecting....I had you down as more of a  :clap:

Well I suppose 'hope' would be more like it than 'expect'. Hope of the realistic kind as opposed to the pie in the sky kind though.

Our ambitions should be to win this league, nothing else is good enough.

Of course last January our ambition should have been to stay up but we did fuck all about it.

I still haven't got a clue how we'll do this season. I'm happier now we've got two physical strikers but Phil Smith still gives me kittens and we need an organiser at the back - We need a Greer or Vincent - hopefully Comazzi is that man. With McCormakc fit we'll be alright in midfield. I think J Smith will end up the season a decent player. I'd be happier with Manky at RB but he's dissapeared. I think we've got enough options in the team.
Flint looks better than I thought and will end up being the new Shaun Taylor.
I think there is a lot of promise but whether it comes together is another matter. We need to wise up at the back - just like last season.
I didn't think much of the Scum. They created little and they didn't win the game  - we lost it by being fuckwits. Play offs at best for them.    
I hope Crawley go into self destruct. I expect Rotherham to be up there. Wouldn't be surprised if Sturrock was up there as well. Accrington could well be in the PO again.  

Honestly think that the people who expect us to go up most are the board.

They set ticket prices assuming we would have some sort of champagne season.

I still think we can do it (not much point going week in week out otherwise).

Getting back to league 1 will be good enough. Who gives a fuck if we win or not to do it.

I don't care if we win the league, finish in the top 3, win the play-offs or get promoted because every other team that finished above us went bankrupt. So long as we get the fuck out of this fucking league.

This

Yeah, the admin have got to shoulder the blame for not being fucking psychic.

I forsee a Colin Todd type season.

and Sies right,how can we tell if someones a mong before they mongalise?

I would say with a name like keemo it was quite fucking obvious :D

I reckon Reg is secretly an Oxf*rd fan who's been in hiding waiting for this season to be a wind-up merchant...   :D

We'll come good, but whether or not we click into gear in time to make the top three remains to be seen.  Crawley are off to a flier and with their resources you have to say they'll be there or thereabouts.

On paper, we've a great squad for this league, albeit bulked out by some relative unknowns.  Early signs are good, and I'd be alarmed if we finished outside the playoffs.  Too many League One teams have dropped into this league before silently slipping out the league altogether.

We are playing catch up with the side not yet complete or ready to have a charge at promotion. Di canio has experimented in every game so far. If this settles quickly and the team more or less picks itself then we should still have enough time to be pushing. The longer it goes on the harder it gets. Worryingly a few of the new sigings don't seem good enough imo.

On sundays showing the keeper,one centre back,left mid and both in the middle were not good enough. Our new forward options look positive though. The lad who came on left mid looked decent as he went at the defender rather than a simple pass inside. Happy with the full backs, Flint and Ritchie.

I just want us to play our wingers on their natural sides .....

Why though? it's not a massively big deal if they don't Ritchie is more than capable from there he cuts inside and gets his shots off, Gabilondo maybe not as he may as well have had his left foot amputated going by Sunday but Esajas is more than capable down there, he faded in the 2nd half but 1st half I thought he looked good.

how many times did he run at their right back?  how many crosses did he put in the box? a flid with one finger can count that for you

Arriba you do talk a lot of sense when it comes to football in particular. Easily the most realistic and objective views on Sunday's game and your team's situation in general.

Di Canio needs to finish his experimenting in the next few games or you'll be playing catch-up big time, or worse.

I dont mind them cutting back inside every now and then but not all the time!

I just think there were times in the second half the Oxford centre backs could choreograph what the wingers were going to do, and set themselves accordingly because hardly ever did a wnger of ours get to the byline and ping it in from there.  Maybe they should look to switch wing during games to give the full backs something different to think about?

Best to have wingers who are able to play both sides, and can switch throughout a match.