Karl Robinson's tinkering ahead of this season was meant to make Oxford genuine promotion challengers, but something has gone wrong.
Four points from their opening five matches is not the start they were after, and the attacking performances have been lethargic and blunt.
Whilst Robinson's system has rightly come under criticism for how it has effected Oxford going forward, perhaps there is not as much attention on what it has done at the other end of the pitch.
This system and team was created to make Oxford more robust and defensively solid. It has certainly done that, according to xG anyway.
It is surprising then that nearly half the division have conceded less or the same as United's five goals this season.
Oxford's supposedly stellar performances at the back have also only yielded one clean sheet.
So if Oxford are so good in defence, then why do they keep conceding?
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Whilst Oxford's defensive strengths are not immediately obvious, the underlying numbers show that they should be the best defensive team in League One right now.
Expected Goals (xG) is a measure of the quality of chances that a side creates and concedes, and this shows the merits to Robinson's system despite the team's early struggles.
No League One team has conceded a lower open play xG against than Oxford (2.04), as they have consistently prevented sides from breaking them down in open play.
Against an admittedly flat Morecambe side, they conceded just three shots all game, an indication of how they have usually been able to keep things tight at the back even when they are trying to chase games.
Only Ipswich Town (21) have conceded fewer open play shots than Oxford (30) this season, as sides struggle to find good shooting opportunities against United.
Oxford have generally been able to contain the number of high quality shots that come in too, with 42% of the shots they have conceded this season coming from outside of the area, the fifth highest proportion in League One.
Of course, you cannot simply be strong defensively from open play, but United have also shown themselves to be the best side at defending set pieces.
Their xG conceded from set pieces is the lowest in League One at 0.47, an incredibly small total which suggests Oxford 'should' concede a goal from a set play roughly every ten matches.
United's defensive numbers from set plays is startling, having conceded only six shots from them this season, the third lowest in the EFL behind only Carlisle and West Brom (5 each).
This is likely impacted by the relatively low number of set plays Oxford have conceded this season, as they have generally limited the amount of time teams have been able to spend in the attacking third.
No League One team has had a lower average percentage action in their defensive third than Oxford (26%), showing how the opposition have rarely been able to sustain attacks.
This illustrates that, though Oxford have not been able to regularly dominate games by attacking, their opponents find it very difficult to gain territory against them.
This has helped United to a total xG conceded of 2.51, comfortably the lowest in League One and the fourth lowest in the EFL.
United's total shots against of 7.2 is also the lowest in League One, emphasizing how United have been extremely good at containing their opposition.
That number also puts United fifth for fewest shots conceded in England's top four divisions.
This data comes with some caveats; one being that it is a small sample size, and two that the sides United have played have not been stellar going forward.
In fact, four of the five teams they have played this season rank in the bottom six for xG scored.
Still, Oxford's defensive stats have been incredibly impressive, and clearly Robinson has solved the problem of making Oxford less easy to breakdown.
The harder puzzle to solve is why Oxford are still conceding despite their defensive strengths.
Bad Luck
Though it is frustrating to hear Robinson blaming poor fortune for Oxford's results this season, there is clearly some merit to this argument.
According to Oxford's xG against, they have conceded 2.49 more goals than you would expect given the quality of chances they have given up. That's the third highest underperformance in League One.
Having conceded an incredible 14 goals, Burton should be considered as an outlier on that graphic, and United clearly have been the victim of some overperformance from their opposition in front of goal.
The fact that three of the five goals Oxford have conceded in the league this season have come from outside of the box could simply point to a run of good finishing against United, something which should not last for an entire season.
Only Burton Albion (0.16) have conceded more goals per shot faced than Oxford (0.14), suggesting that teams are converting their chances with unexpected regularity against the Us.
Oxford probably have been a tad unlucky with some good finishing from the opposition, but it is difficult to continue using that as an excuse as the goals keep coming, and there is likely a deeper reason for Oxford's tendency to concede.
Goalkeeping
It is far to early to reopen this can of worms, but it is worth touching upon after fans were left frustrated by Morecambe's opener on Saturday.
Simon Eastwood deserves time to show his worth again, and these numbers are massively impacted by the small sample size, but the early indications on Eastwood's return are not brilliant.
Oxford's goals conceded per shot on target (0.45) is behind only Cambridge (0.47) in League One, and those two are way ahead of the rest of the division.
This shows that when teams are getting their shots on target against Oxford, they are scoring with alarming regularity.
The U's shots stopper currently has a save percentage of 50%, the lowest in League One.
Opta Analyst's goalkeeping statistics also paint a rather gloomy early season picture.
Eastwood has faced an Expected goals on target (xGOT, the expected goal value of a shot on target, giving more value to a shot in the corner than one down the middle) of 2.5, and has conceded double that.
That puts him 2.5 goals below his expected performance, and leaves him as the third lowest of League One keepers to have played over 50% of their team's minutes by this metric.
However, when considering the number of shots that Eastwood has faced by looking at his 'goals prevented rate', he drops further down the rankings.
Simon Eastwood's 'goals prevented rate' (0.5) is the worst in League One, and is the fourth lowest in all of Europe's top five divisions plus the EFL.
These numbers come with the huge caveat of such a small sample size, and given the freakishly small number of shots Oxford have actually conceded this season, Eastwood's numbers likely look much worse than they actually are.
Some below par keeping may be one reason United have conceded so many goals, but he hasn't been at fault for all of them, and cannot be held individually responsible.
Lack of Defensive Urgency
There is an argument that Oxford have simply not been urgent enough in their defending, standing off far too often and not throwing enough bodies in the way.
This felt like the case when Scully nonchalantly curled past Eastwood and again when Weir had time to pick his corner to put Morecambe ahead on Saturday.
This lack of defensive urgency is shown in the stats, where Oxford have averaged just 2.6 blocked shots per game, ranking them 17th in the division.
They are one place lower when it comes to clearances, averaging 15.6 per 90.
These are of course impacted by Oxford's lack of chances conceded, which means you wouldn't expect a particularly high volume of defensive actions, but they still seem to be somewhat lethargic in their closing down.
Only Exeter (8.8) and Derby (9) have averaged fewer tackles per game than Oxford (9.6), perhaps showing that they are too slow to get a foot in, allowing their opponents time to fashion shots and facilitating the high quality of finishing already discussed.
Lack of Protection from Full Backs and Holding Midfielder
Robinson's style has always been to push his full backs forward, so we shouldn't be surprised Seddon and Long are still being urged forward.
However, without a genuine holding player like Gorrin, this has sometimes left the centre backs isolated, and perhaps is a reason teams have been able to generate so many open shooting opportunities.
Looking at the average position maps from Oxford's last three League One games, courtesy of Whoscored.com, some similar trends emerge...
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| Oxford vs Bristol Rovers (Attacking from Right to Left) |
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| Oxford vs Lincoln (Attacking from Left to Right) |
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| Oxford vs Morecambe (Attacking from Left to Right) |
In each one of those images, you can see how high the full backs (Seddon, number 42 and Long, 2) push forward, particularly Sam Long, often leaving huge spaces in behind them.
McGuane (18) is also often caught drifting forward, sometimes in front of Brannagan, Bate or Henry, leaving Moore and Findlay very isolated at the back.
It is important that Oxford were chasing the game in all of these matches, so it is unsurprising to see the full back and midfield pushing so high up, but this perhaps does show why when teams do breakthrough, they often create overloads against the back two and therefore have open shooting positions.
A high proportion of the shots Oxford have conceded this season have come from the oppositions left wing (28% compared to 19% on the right), perhaps showing how teams are exploiting the space in behind Long as he pushes up.
This would likely not be so costly if United had a true holding midfielder, but with McGuane or Bate in the middle, they do not have quite the same level of protection for the onrushing full backs.
This is shown as United have averaged just 6.6 interceptions per 90, the joint second lowest figure in League One, indicating how they do not have a holding player to cut out the passes in behind, and often it only takes one or two incisive passes a match for a team to get in at United's back two and score.
It is unlikely that Robinson's philosophy regarding attacking full backs and midfielders will change, but it might be worth offering a little more protection to the centre backs when teams are countering Oxford.
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All of these issues are resolvable (minus perhaps the keeper, given McGinty does not look like a particularly calm set of gloves yet), and five goals conceded in five games is not a disastrous rate by any stretch of the imagination.
However, whilst Oxford are creating so little, conceding one goal a game is one goal too many, and they need to try something to make their goals against tally match their excellent defensive system.
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