It’s been a quieter week for Oxford United who made their way back from the pre-season tour of Indonesia.
Head coach Gary Rowett has reflected on the trip, while there has been another loan departure from the club.
Read More: Oxford United Weekly Round-Up: Indonesia Final Defeat and Transfer Activity
Oxford United Weekly Round-Up: Rowett on Indonesia and Defender Joins Northampton
Rowett Reflects On Indonesia Trip
Oxford head coach Gary Rowett had admitted that his side may be behind schedule as they prepare for the Championship campaign.
While they played three fixtures during their trip to Indonesia, there has been limited training due to the heat, along with illness and injuries across the camp.
Speaking to the Oxford Mail, he said: “It’s been a learning exercise, it’s been a different experience from a cultural perspective. To come out to a country like this and see some of the things that we’ve seen, it definitely changes your perspective on things, even from a football perspective.
“We spoke about it. The players have gone out to see kids train and invited them in, and that’s what it’s been about for us really and just trying to get the fitness.
“Fitness has been a challenge to get of course. We’re now going to struggle to train for four days because we’re all travelling back in different planes and whatnot.
“I don’t know how much of a learning perspective comes from it football-wise. Maybe how to handle this tournament a little bit better, to minimise the impact it might have on our season. That’s probably more important for me.
“If you were to come out here again, you might do it slightly differently, but my focus at the moment is on the next three weeks of pre-season because we haven’t got that much pre-season left. This has obviously impacted quite a large part of that.
“Making sure we can get back to finding some sort of rhythm training-wise. We’ve hardly trained out here.
“What we have to do now is get back to some rhythm. The next time we’ll be in is Friday, so it’s not ideal preparation, but we just need to get the rhythm back and find out where we are.
“We might be a little bit behind in terms of our preparations, but hopefully it won’t impact us too much.”
Big Injuries Suffered on Pre-Season Tour
Rowett has confirmed that Ole Romeny will be sidelined for some time while summer signing, Brian De Keersmaecker, was fortunate not to suffer a broken leg.
Speaking on Romeny, who was on the end of a physical challenge in the second game against Arema, he said: “I don’t know the exact timescale. It looks quite a bad injury, so it wasn’t one that was very pleasing for us to lose someone like Ole.
“I’m sure for the national team as well and the way that we lost him with the tackle. It was a poor tackle at the time, but we’ll assess it, and we’ll see what that timescale looks like
As for De Keersmaecker, he was on the receiving end of a heavy challenge in the final against Port. While he managed to hobble off the pitch, it could mean he faces a spell on the sidelines.
Rowett said: “My first and foremost is basically making sure that everybody got out unscathed. Brian De Keersmaecker I would say is very lucky he hasn’t got a broken leg. It might well be quite serious. It looked like a very poor tackle and exactly what you don’t want at this stage of the tournament.”
Defender Joins the Cobblers
On Thursday, Oxford defender Jordan Thorniley joined League One side Northampton on a season-long loan.
The 28-year-old, who has turned out 46 times for the U’s over two separate spells, has found game time limited over the past 18 months.
