Striker Steve MacLean says United will be determined to wreck Chesterfield’s promotion celebrations.

“They’ll bring a few fans down, it’ll be a big crowd and hopefully we can spoil their party,” he said.

MacLean’s own Oxford season really began in the match in Derbyshire, where United ended a run of five straight defeats with a surprise 2-1 win.

“When we went up to Chesterfield we had our backs against the wall and I think everybody was thinking ‘how many are they were going to get beat by?’ “But we just showed what this league’s like. We turned them over, we won the game, and we played really well that night.

“We’ve shown against the best teams we can beat anybody, so we’ll not be scared whatsoever of them.

“But we’ll have to respect them. They’re top of the league for one reason and one reason only – because they’ve been the best team.

“But we’ll be letting them know we’re there and hopefully we can get the three points.”

MacLean dropped to the bench at Accrington last week, but said: “Last week, to be fair, I’d been up in Scotland, something had happened up the road.

“The gaffer spoke to me . . . yes, it’s not nice being on the bench – I want to play every game – but that’s football, you’ve got to respect his decisions.”