Eventually the skating girl grew tired of waving cheerily at quizzical looking bald men and disappeared down the tunnel. Moments later, in front of a bumper crowd of over 9,000 (Macclesfield Town had generously brought 61) Oxford United took to the pitch. As the game got underway, it seemed that the crowd was suffering from a post-Christmas hangover and it took a wild tackle by the Macclesfield right-back Izak Reid on James Constable to fire the Oxford faithful back into life after a painful 24 day absence. The growing support of the crowd was clearly felt by the Oxford United players on the pitch. Clever link-up play between Constable and Steve MacLean who combined well throughout put Simon Heslop in on goal who, after an ugly first touch managed to sneak the ball home. In truth, Oxford were very comfortable for the remainder of the first half with MacLean at the heart of everything. After watching the Scot struggle at home to Gillingham, I was beginning to see glimpses of the player who had scored 25 goals in one Championship season for Sheffield Wednesday. Macclesfield did not appear to have any players of such calibre; their left-back, exotically named Aristote Nsiala, was even worse than Northampton’s Liam Davis and takes the prize for most inept player I have seen so far this season.
The second half was not as rosy as the first. For a start, the swirling mist was making it increasingly difficult to pick out the players. Indeed, the 61 Macclesfield fans and Oxford supporters at the furthest end of the North Stand had disappeared from view altogether. Furthermore, we had been brought down to Macclesfield’s level which led to the game becoming a physical slog void of any trickery or invention. That was until, with twenty minutes left, Alfie Potter took off on one of his dazzling runs similar to that famous one at Wembley. After covering over half the pitch, he squared the ball for Beano to smash into the roof of the net. Game over, surely.
Not quite. In classic Oxford United fashion the last ten minutes became an unnecessarily tense affair after a long-throw where goalkeeper Ryan Clarke was clearly impeded found its way into the back of the net through former Oxford loanee Reneil ‘Ricky’ Sappleton. Sappleton is another of those players you will only ever see in the football league. To put it politely, the chubby forward had clearly enjoyed one too many mince pies over the festive period. In my ideal word ‘Ricky’ will one day join up with Adebayo Akinfenwa. A 33 stone forward line would make fantastic viewing.
Not a wholly convincing performance from Oxford United, but after that appalling run of five defeats, a third consecutive victory will do nicely and we can feel confident going into Saturday’s game at home to Southend United.
