Oxford United boss on shape at Saints & Donley absence

The U’s reverted to a back five, similarly to their January win at Leicester City, as playmaker Donley made way for full back Brodie Spencer who was positioned at right wing back.

Myles Peart-Harris also returned to the squad after missing against Charlton Athletic through injury, replacing winger Aidomo Emakhu.

“We’ve actually been defending with that shape for the last five games,” Bloomfield confessed.

Matt Bloomfield applauds the Oxford United fans after defeat to Southampton (Image: Jason Dawson)

“We’ve been using Stan to drop down so it wasn’t a huge amount different to what we’ve been doing. It’s just a slight personnel change because we wanted Stan high up the pitch because we know how good he is in transition.

“It felt like today we wanted him one higher and that was the reasoning for that.

“We know that Southampton are a team that dominate possession and it felt like, when we won the ball back, we wanted to find Miles and Stan in those two ten positions to counter-attack.

Oxford United’s Stan Mills battles Southampton’s Shea Charles (Image: Jason Dawson)

“Myles has done it a few times, especially one really early on and it looked like the plan was working. Stan’s second half, again we got him in the game in terms of that transition play.

“It was a really tough decision to leave out Jamie Donley. He’s been playing incredibly well but we didn’t want Stan to be too deep in his position as a right wing-back defensively today. We wanted him higher up the pitch so he could cause as much damage as possible because he’s been in incredible form for us and that was the reason behind that decision.”

Brodie Spencer lunges for the ball for Oxford United (Image: Jason Dawson)

The Yellows conceded the opener after just six minutes when Cyle Larin tapped home, receiving the ball from Tom Fellows who was slotted in behind the defence by Saints centre back Taylor Harwood-Bellis.

“We just switched off defensively,” the U’s boss admitted.

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“The first goal was very preventable, something we’d planned for so we’re really disappointed with that.

“It’s the reason we went with five defenders. We know that Southampton are a team that dominate the ball and want to pierce your final line with runners either from wide areas or the eights.

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Southampton’s Cyle Larin (centre) celebrates scoring their side’s first goal of the game during the Sky Bet Championship match at St Mary’s Stadium, Southampton (Image: Peter Tarry/PA Wire)

“So we needed the extra body to mitigate that but unfortunately for us we switched off in that moment and found ourselves 1-0 down.

“Probably a bit of a mixture of emotions for me because to be 2-0 down so early but to still perform in the manner that we did, to show the fight and the courage that we did to keep playing, I’m actually really proud of the players.

“[But] really disappointed to be 2-0 down so early.”