Oxford United’s former West Ham player Andy Melville says the Premier League outfit are “a proper club” who do things right.

Former Wales international defender Melville was at Upton Park from 2004-2005 but admitted: “I haven’t been back since.

“I think there’s been a lot of changes there as well.

“Mark Noble’s there, and I’ll recognise a few people in and around the place. But player-wise and management-wise, there won’t be many I know.”

Melville has great respect for the place. “It’s a proper club, a really big club,” he says. “West Ham’s a different class, really well run and they do things right.

“I really enjoyed myself there. It didn’t go too well for me at the time, but the people in and around the place made me feel very welcome.”

In Melville’s first season, Hammers finished fourth in the Championship, reaching the play-offs, but lost 1-0 to Crystal Palace in the final at the Millennium Stadium.

The ex-U’s centre back started the next season as first-choice, but was then loaned to Nottingham Forest.

“It was near the end of my career,” he said. “I went from Fulham to West Ham and played about 20-odd games for them. Christian Dailly was my centre back partner.”

Hammers boss Avram Grant may rest one or two stars because their next Premier League fixtures are against Man Utd and Chelsea. Or will he play them all, hoping morale will be boosted with a win?

Melville said: “We know it’s going to be a difficult game, obviously depending on what sort of side West Ham put out – I don’t know whether they might mix it around a little bit, but we’re going to prepare as usual and nothing changes.

“That’s the way we always go about it. We’ll prepare properly against a very good football club and hopefully on the night we can match them.”

OXFORD United will have more than 3,000 fans cheering them on tonight.

MOST bookmakers make Oxford a 7-1 long shot to win, with West Ham 1-3 and the draw 7-2.

REMEMBER Alex Dyer, the former Oxford United striker? He’s West Ham’s reserve team manager.