Oxford United’s pre-season schedule is now complete after the announcement of a prestigious friendly away at Glasgow Rangers.
The U’s kick off their pre-season at Ibrox on July 7th after a week of training in Portugal, and Head Coach Karl Robinson can’t wait for things to kick off again.
“It’s a marquee game for a club at this level to go and play at Ibrox against a club of Rangers’ size” he told iFollow. “It’s early in pre-season but Rangers have been excellent with us and I am sure the fans will love it. We also play QPR and Fulham which will be good tests for us. I’m not an advocate of the Premier League games in pre-season, although we would have taken one for financial reasons. To be fair to Tiger he listened to what we needed football-wise; in terms of preparation and preparation then Championship games are more competitive and robust plus they are getting ready to kick off at the same time as us - a Premier League side in mid July is still four weeks away from their first game.”
It’s a break in routine for Karl who has been taking sides to Ireland for pre-season for many years, including the U’s last summer
“I have been going to Ireland a long time now and I think I needed a break from the norm” he explained. “I wouldn’t bet against it next year but I felt I needed something different, something to challenge me and the coaching staff.”
Pre-season will be carefully monitored by the Sports Science team and headed up by Chris Short, who Karl is more than happy to have involved for a second season.
“Shorty has signed for next year as well which is great news” he said. “He got so many great messages back when he put it in the group chat and it’s fantastic that he will be with us again because he is really important to us. I am really excited and really looking forward to it now.“
See the full interview in iFollow