MARK Jones declared himself happy with Oxford City’s pre-season schedule overall as their warm-up games finished with a 1-0 home defeat to Brackley Town.

Jimmy Armson scored the only goal of a closely-fought friendly at Court Place Farm, in what was City’s dress rehearsal for their Vanarama National South opener against St Albans City this Saturday.

City manager Jones felt the winner should not have stood, but has been generally encouraged by what his side have produced in the last month.

He said: “There wasn’t a lot in it.

“The second half was a bit scrappy and we were on the end of a goal that looked like it was offside.

“(Overall) it’s been a really decent pre-season for us.

“We’ve had plenty of challenges along the way, there have been plenty of games where we’ve had a lot of the ball and had to try to work out ways to break teams down.

“I’ve been generally happy, but it’s pre-season – we haven’t won any points and we haven’t lost any.

“The real stuff starts next Saturday.”

City looked bright early on against Brackley, but the closest they came was a Godfrey Poku effort which flew the wrong side of the far post.

The second half saw more goalmouth action and Brackley went ahead in the 57th minute, when Armson exploited a dozing City defence and finished neatly past goalkeeper Craig Hill.

Substitute Justin Bennett forced a smart save from Saints’ stopper Danny Lewis with a dipping shot just after coming on.

In a strong finish, Zac McEachran thought he had equalised, only for the referee to disallow the goal for a foul by Reece Fleet in the build-up.

Joe Oastler nearly forced a bizarre leveller late on, when his sliding challenge deflected the ball on to the near post and rolled along the goal-line before it was cleared.