PREVIEW Oxford United v Fleetwood Town

Oxford United take on Fleetwood Town at the Kassam Stadium this evening (7.45pm)

The U's hope to be able to announce an Emergency Loan goalkeeper in time for the game to provide cover for Simon Eastwood, who misses tonight’s game and the game at home to Rotherham United on Saturday while he self-isolates, and for Jack Stevens who is still recovering from a non-covid related illness.

With Kie Plumley also unavailable for the next two games under covid protocols Youth Team keeper Eddie Brearey steps up and will be on the bench tonight.

The U's have 13 players unavailable tonight through either covid or injuries but the game goes ahead and boss Karl Robinson is calling on fans to get behind the players in difficult circumstances.

"We are up against it, everyone knows that, but players will give it everything they have got and I think fans always see it when that happens. I hope everyone coming tonight gets right behind the team and if we all stick together we can hopefully keep our good run going."

See Karl and Gavin Whyte previewing the game in iFollow.

THE OPPOSITION
Fleetwood boss Simon Grayson is hoping his side can start a run of four away games with a win tonight but admits his side are in a tough place after defeat to Morecambe left them in 22nd place in the table.

“When you are going through a tough time, you have to make sure you don’t bury your heads in the sand” he said. “You have to roll your sleeves up, pump your chest out and go again. I’ve been involved in football nearly 35 years and all the way through, there has been ups and downs, but I’ve always made sure that I can bounce back up – that’s what we are telling the players.

“We’ve got to be positive; we need to go there and do the right business, play the way that we can, and manage to turn the negative result against Morecambe into a positive one.

“There will be a few players with knocks from the game today, Harrison [Holgate] has just come back from injury so we will have to be careful with him. The team on Tuesday night will be assessed on who is available because we are really down to the bare bones.”