Norwich did not benefit from a dream begin as they have been held to a 1-1 draw by Oxford in a hard-fought Sky Wager Championship conflict at Carrow Street.
The Canaries went forward after simply 5 minutes when Josh Sargent netted his twelfth purpose of the season, and his eighth in eight matches, and went on to dominate for lengthy durations.
However Oxford obtained an equaliser out of nowhere from Mark Harris 13 minutes later and went on to defend gallantly to safe a hard-fought draw that took them eight factors away from the drop zone.
Norwich moved to inside three factors of the highest six – though they’ll regard this as a missed alternative and two factors dropped fairly than one gained.
With Angus Gunn and George Lengthy each out injured younger Chilean goalkeeper Vincente Reyes made his debut for the Canaries and was referred to as into motion after simply 25 seconds to clutch a shot from Ole Romeny out of the air.
Josh Sargent opens the scoring in opposition to Oxford United
However Norwich regarded the extra harmful facet early on they usually have been quickly in entrance as Sargent maintained his scorching streak in entrance of purpose.
Oxford have been caught out by an outstanding go behind the left of defence from Callum Doyle and Kellen Fisher put in a exact low cross that was side-footed house from shut vary by the in-form American worldwide.
The guests rapidly put the early setback behind them, equalising within the 18th minute as Will Vaulks’ lengthy throw caught Norwich out. The ball flicked off a defender into the trail of Harris, whose shot on the flip from contained in the six-yard field gave Reyes no probability.
Norwich dominated the rest of the half with out creating one other clear probability, though Sargent did have a purpose dominated out by a good offside choice simply earlier than the break.
Ante Crnac shot straight at Jamie Cumming from a great place because the hosts maintained their ahead momentum after the restart, with the Croatian frontman then seeing a fierce rising drive tipped over.
Norwich continued to pile on the strain and with a minute of regular time remaining Borja Sainz burst clear on the left and, with a transparent sight of purpose, was denied by the outstretched leg of Cumming.
The managers
Norwich’s Johannes Hoff Thorup:
“I am annoyed and disappointed that a performance like that didn’t give us three points.
“In video games like that, 9 occasions out of 10 you’ll win it.
“I was pleased with a lot of what we did but the end product was not good enough.”
Oxford’s Gary Rowett:
“I thought the lads showed real character tonight.
“After conceding a purpose so early, it might have been straightforward for the heads to drop and concede two or three extra.
“This is a difficult place to come to and they have a lot of good players but we worked really hard to nullify them.
“I feel we deserved some extent for the trouble we put in and to be truthful, though they’d a whole lot of the ball, they did not have too many clear-cut probabilities.”
