Manager Chris Wilder said his Oxford United players were deeply hurt by Tuesday’s defeat at Luton, but Saturday’s home game against Histon gives them the opportunity to put that behind them and march on.

“We can’t harp on about what’s gone on in the past,” he said.

“When people were saying in September and October ‘we’ve just seen the champions’, I was never one to be taken in by that. For me, that was always a load of rubbish.”

Oxford have won only one of their last five league games, while rivals Stevenage and York have managed three and four wins, respectively.

“There’s always going to be twists and turns,” Wilder said. “You see it in every league.

“We got off to an absolutely storming start and other teams are having good parts of the season now. It just cements what a fantastic start we had.

“Ideally, we wouldn’t have wanted to have dropped the points we have done over the last three or four games, but that happens.

“We can’t look back to Luton, the missed chances against Kidderminster, to the bits and pieces that have happened against Tamworth and Salisbury – we’ve got to look forward to the next game.

“We’ve got 18 games left, subject to the Chester decision, and we need a certain number of wins to be where we want to be.

“There will be twists and turns every week now. We’ve got to focus, as always, on the next game.”

He added: “The boys were definitely hurting, we saw that on Tuesday. We’ve got players that do hurt. But is that a bad thing or a good thing? For me, it’s a good thing.

“I don’t think it’s maybe hurt the players enough at this football club over the past four or five years.

“There’s plenty of life in us, plenty of mental strength in that changing room, and they’ve got to go out and prove that whenever they step out onto the pitch.”