Neil Aspin will be hoping that his side can avenge their defeat to Swindon Town last time out as Oxford United make the trip to Vale Park on Friday night.

United, who ply their trade in Sky Bet League One, face the Valiants in the Emirates FA Cup First Round and both sets of players will be looking to advance to the next stage of the competition. 

Ahead of the tie, Aspin has reassured his players that they can cause an upset if they play to their full potential, but he knows it will be a very difficult test.

“If we play like we did against Swindon we will have no chance, but if we play to our best and perform like we did at Exeter, we are capable of giving them a good test”, the manager said. 

“But, having seen Oxford play, they have some very talented players and they keep the ball well - I would say they’re better than the level they’re playing at.

“If they play to their maximum they will be a difficult proposition for us, but we’ve just got to work hard and improve to give ourselves the best chance of progressing.”

With injuries ruling a number of players out of contention for Vale, Aspin will have the task of selecting a line-up from the fit members of the squad, but he has been handed more bad news.

Joe Davis and Tryone Barnett have been added to the list of players on the sideline due to problems picked up in training this week. However, Anton Forrester is available having featured for the reserves once again on Tuesday.

On the situation, Aspin said: “We’ve lost two players, but Anton played 80 minutes at York and he felt fine so he is now available.

“Joe pulled his thigh in training on Monday and Tyrone tweaked his groin on Tuesday so that’s a new injury - both of them will be out for a few weeks.”

Despite a couple of players picking up injuries during training, Aspin has seen a positive response from the squad in sessions this week and he insists that they are ready for Friday’s encounter.

He said: “The players have trained well since I’ve been here and Saturday’s game was the first time that I felt they were poor. 

“Instead of criticising for the sake of it, we’ve been looking at the reasons as to why we lost against Swindon and reminding the players of what they need to do.

“The main thing we must do is to try and outwork the opposition. We can’t turn up to games and expect to win, we’re going to have to work very hard to get the most out of matches.”