COMMENTS this week by the two high-profile players who left the Manor mid-season have only highlighted the difference between them, and the difference in the way the fans perceive them.

While striker Dean Windass was complaining after United's 0-0 draw at Bradford last Saturday that he couldn't understand why everyone wanted to have a go at him, goalkeeper Phil Whitehead was desperately disappointed that his efforts against Bury don't look like being enough to keep Oxford up.

Windass said he was shocked to read the comments by West Brom boss Denis Smith that he was a bad boy who would cause problems in the dressing room if he wasn't playing in a winning team.

"He has called me a bad apple in the dressing room but he doesn't even know me," Windass said.

"How on earth can he have a go at me when I have never worked for the man?

"My conscience is clear because I reckon I did pretty well for Oxford. "I scored 18 goals for them, so nobody can say I didn't do my bit to give them a chance of staying up."

Yet many United fans feel he betrayed the team by effectively demanding a move and his statement last week that it wouldn't worry him if he scored the goal that sent Oxford down only irritated them even more.

Contrast him with Whitehead.

After West Brom's 1-0 win over Bury, the keeper said: "I was ready to give it everything. My old club Oxford are in trouble and I don't want to see a lot of my old pals go down."

Paul Jewell's post-match quote that he felt "as sick as a garrison's swill bin" was one that Bradford fan JB Priestley would have savoured and made a change from parrots, pigs and surmounting lunar objects.

Story date: Friday 07 May

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