We’ve been chatting to our number one Mark Oxley ahead of Saturday’s match with contest with Exeter. You can watch the full interview here…
Oxley on his penalty save against Leyton Orient and how he prepared for the possibility of it…
The day before a game and on the day, we look through clips of the opposition. Our analyst Glen sends them out and I get the clips of players’ previous penalties so fair play to Glen for arranging all that. There were a couple of clips and one of them was the lad who took the penalty against me.
That was the main thing (to keep hold of the ball), you’ve just got to throw yourself at it and luckily it bounced near me so I could get straight on it. Sometimes they come away from you and there’s nothing more demoralising than the player knocking in a rebound, so I was grateful for that as well.
On the team performance against Orient…
It was brilliant. We said before the game ‘be hard to beat’ and from minute one Lukey (Luke Armstrong) up top set the tone with his chasing and harrying down. Everyone mucked in and had a part to play so it was a really
good League Two away performance.
On the importance of staying focused as a goalkeeper…
That’s part and parcel of being a goalkeeper, I think. You can have games where you get peppered every minute and it’s a completely different game. Other games you might only be required a couple of times, but you’ve got to make sure you’re ready for that. As you get older you realise that’s what you need to be ready for and luckily, I’ve been at the right place at the right time.
On whether there’s a different type of pressure arriving as a new goalkeeper…
You’re based on what you do in games, and I’ve always said it’s hard to show you care as a keeper as you can’t run around or show that type of passion. Like I said, you’re judged on the saves you make so it’s making sure you’re ready in those moments to try and produce.
On what we can expect against Exeter on Saturday…
It’ll be another tough game. We had Leyton Orient on Tuesday and Exeter had a good result last weekend so I’m sure they’ll be buoyed from that. I’ve said many a times, I don’t think there’s much in this league and every game is always a hard game, so we’ll be ready for a tough game but hopefully we’ll get something from it again.
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