A Championship return for Oxford against Norwich City will be a special day for boyhood fan and head coach Des Buckingham.

The 39-year-old guided his hometown club back to the second tier through the League One play-offs, with Josh Murphy the two-goal Wembley hero.

Murphy has since moved on to Portsmouth but ahead of the Canaries' Saturday lunchtime opening day kick-off, Buckingham insists the excitement is building.

“The club wanted to be a Championship club. For the first time in 25 years, that is what we are,” he said, in a piece for the Coaches Voice. “Now we want to become a sustainable Championship club. We’ve got owners and people behind the scenes who are very supportive. Everything that was said to me when I joined has happened. They weren’t just words.

“There is a lot of work to do. I shortened my holiday to make sure we’re as prepared as we can be for the new season, to compete and win. We don’t want to be a team that tries not to lose games in the Championship.

“I’ve spoken a lot about identity, who we are and what we are. I want to take that into the Championship, and see where we can take it.

“I’m not naive enough to think we can go and do that in every game. But if Wembley showed anything, it was the need to be clear on what we do, how we do it, and be smart in how we set up.

"Then it becomes about recruitment, and giving the players what we can in terms of the set-up of our club. We’ll position ourselves as well as we can to try and make the people, in and around Oxfordshire, proud of what we do and how we do it.”

Buckingham was a youth player at Oxford before a decade coaching at the club prior to a spell in New Zealand and then being part of the City Group working at Melbourne City and Indian Super League club Mumbai.

The Oxford-born boss replaced Liam Manning at the Kassam in November 2023. Oxford beat Bolton at Wembley in the play-off final, but it was a 5-0 hammering in the league that proved a turning point for Buckingham. 

Josh Murphy fired Oxford back to the Championship at Wembley before moving onto Portsmouth (Image: PA Images)

“There were a couple of dark days after that game – and it was a true test, if I’m being honest,” he said. “That was the moment where I said: ‘This is it.’ I had spoken about giving it time, but now I needed to do things the way I wanted to do them.

"If it didn’t work out, okay. At least I would have given it a go, doing my best. As it was, we all stuck together, drawing on what was a very tough time for everybody.

“I reverted to what I wanted to do and how I wanted to do it, which was how I’d set teams up previously, with success. As much as the Bolton defeat was painful, it gave us a springboard. When we played Port Vale in our next game, on a very difficult pitch, it was back to what we’d seen at Burton.

"The players showed a clear understanding of what we had put across, and we won 2-0. It was a solid foundation for what was to come over the next two months, which included some wonderful performances and results.”