WE head for Northampton this afternoon looking to get another win on the road.

It is one of the shortest trips of the season and a healthy rivalry has developed between the two clubs over the last few years.

Don’t get me wrong, it is nowhere near the rivalry that you get when Oxford play Swindon – that is one of the fiercest you will ever experience.

But there is an extra edge to games against Northampton because they were our rivals for promotion last season and we have had some very close, very intense matches against them.

I said a couple of games ago that I was going to freshen things up in the four fixtures before Wembley.

I will stick to that plan today.

The one change would be if John Lundstram is unavailable through injury – he suffered a dead leg in Tuesday’s game against Bolton.

Clearly it isn’t a long-term problem, but it does limit a player’s movement and we need everyone at full throttle right now.

If John isn’t fully fit, or we think that by playing him we may make the injury worse, then he won’t be involved today.

We hope he is available because he has been an integral part of what we have achieved this season.

I remember people worrying about him earlier in the season and asking me whether being made captain was affecting his game.

I said at the time that it wasn’t, and I stick to that.

Captaincy is a funny thing because everyone does it differently.

I played with guys who changed when they pulled on the armband.

Some of them were loud and used the captaincy to try and gee up the whole team.

Others had a quiet authority and let their own performances lead by example.

There is no right or wrong way of doing it.

What I think happened with John was he worked out the best way to be captain was to be himself.

He didn’t need to try and change personality or copy anyone else, he just needed to let his own personality shine through.

He didn’t need to become a captain, he already was one.

WITH one week to go before our Wembley final we have had a busy time with the local and national media this week.

There have been lots of additional camera crews and journalists around the training ground and I think the lads have enjoyed doing the extra interviews that surround a Wembley final.

There is a lot of commercial activity too and it was good to see Brookes University and Johnson Quarry Group team up with us as well.

One interesting thing this week was SKY having a Go Pro camera in the dressing room when we played Bolton.

Luckily there was no sound on it when we came in 2-1 down at the break!

It seems everyone wants a different angle these days.

We also posed for a new team photo for the Oxford Mail, which will be in a special 20-page supplement on Friday.

I’ll have a read and then give Mark Edwards and David Pritchard marks out of ten like they do to us each week!