OXFORD City won’t make knee-jerk changes to their approach despite their 4-1 humbling at Leamington on Boxing Day, writes MATTHEW BRUCE.

Assistant manager Danny Nich-olls and head coach Enrique Guillen will take charge of the City side as they host Leamington in the return fixture tomorrow while general manager Justin Merritt is away on holiday, but Nicholls insists any changes to the side will be minor.

“What we don’t want is a panic reaction because we’ve been beaten,” he said.

“Since the start of the season we’ve worked hard to establish our style of passing football and we’re not going to change that because of one defeat.

Latest Sport news

“If it happens over a number of games then you have to make changes, but I think it would be the worst message we could send out if we changed things around after just one defeat.”

Nicholls admitted the defeat was a big blow ahead of the return match at Marsh Lane.

However, he maintained that Boxing Day’s poor performance was just a one-off.

“The psychological advantage is with them,” he said.

“We were very poor, but it might work to our advantage this week if they’re expecting the same again.

“We started very sloppy and very slow, but if we can start quickly this time we might surprise them.”

Right back Lee Henderson is back from illness, though he will miss Sunday’s trip to Chorley through suspension after being red-carded against Hyde.

Left back Paul Stonehouse is also available to play despite his sending off on Boxing Day as his suspension is not yet active.

TOMORROW’S SQUAD

Oxford City (v Leamington, home): from De La Cruz, Scott, Henderson, Stonehouse, Del Alamo, Lapoujade, Santiago, Pond, Rodriguez, Winters, Yussuf, Barcelos, Wilson, Benjamin, Insa, Fofana, Murombedzi, Pearson.

  • Do you want alerts delivered straight to your phone via our WhatsApp service? Text NEWS or SPORT or NEWS AND SPORT, depending on which services you want, and your full name to 07767 417704. Save our number into your phone’s contacts as Oxford Mail WhatsApp and ensure you have WhatsApp installed.