Oxford United ended a four-game losing streak with a hard-fought 1-1 draw at MK Dons this afternoon.
Trailing to a Sullay Kaikai goal at the break, United showed real fighting spirit to hit back, with Lewis Bate's first goal for the club enough to give them a point on the road.
United certainly had attacking intent from the start, Tyler Smith making an energetic first start and Ateef Konate, Kyle Joseph and Josh Murphy playing just behind the tigerish Hull loanee. Smith had the first effort on target after 17 minutes, but of course, when the home side created the first real chance of the game, they took it when Kaikai cut in from the left edge of the box and accepted the invitation to shoot, curling the ball perfectly beyond the reach of the diving Simon Eastwood to make it 1-0.
United just needed to stay in the game at that stage. The same player missed a glorious chance to double the lead ten minutes before the break, slicing horribly wide of an unguarded net, and other than the early Smith effort and a late Konate shot that was well defended, United had not really threatened at that stage, giving the ball away too often in dangerous places and grateful to Ciaron Brown and Sam Long, on his 200th appearance, for some resolute defending to limit the danger in front of Eastwood.
It was a different story in the second half. Marcus McGuane replaced Murphy to try to steady the ship in midfield, and although it took a good save from Eastwood to deny Mo Eisa, United then started to force the pace and dominated the rest of the game.
Joseph forced a save from keeper Jamie Cumming, Bate blasted the ball over from the resulting corner and the introduction of Tyler Goodrham and Yanic Wildschut visibly raised the intensity still further for the final half hour.
MK, without a win at home on a Saturday all season, understandably dropped deeper and invited pressure, and with 19 minutes left they regretted that when the terrific Goodrham dug in and won the ball, Bate dummied his way across goal and then the on-loan Leeds midfielder smashed the ball home via the flapping gloves of Cumming, going the wrong way, to level it at 1-1.
Now it was just a question of whether the U's turned one point into three.
In the end it was just beyond them. Brown had a header saved, Wildschut pinged two dangerous crosses across the box and then bustled past three men and dragged his shot an agonising foot the wrong side of the far post. The superb Bate stole the ball, ran fifty yards and gave Joseph a chance to run free, only for his effort to fly over the bar as he rounded the keeper. By the end it was a case of United having to settle for a draw rather than rescuing one.
Just a point? Well United had made at least one more: their togetherness and belief were there for all to see despite a tough run of results.
Not the prettiest game, not a win, but a definite step in the right direction.
Att: 9,116
Away: 2,112
Report by Chris Williams, pictures Steve Daniels, Steve Edmunds, Darrell Fisher