Burton Albion Football Club

Here are Gary Rowett's thoughts on today's game:

"We're very pleased with some of it and not pleased with other bits, but that's always going to be the case on opening day. 

"We've always struggled opening day of the season and we've had some poor results over the years, but I like what we did today. We've carried off from last year with a certain degree and defensively we were excellent again as that was a real hallmark of last seasons performances. 

"It took us a while to get to grips with their shape and I think we need to press with a little more intensity in the first 20 minutes. Once we'd coped with that I thought it was a case of can we see the game out? 

"I'm really pleased, there's loads to work on and a couple of our decisions late in the game were poor and gave us unnecessary pressure, but other than that we were pretty comfortable."

"The great thing with that is Beav (Stuart Beavon) chases things and is really difficult to mark, but he's also got that awareness to bring other people into the game. With Lucas you rarely see him if the balls on the left staying out on the wing and he always tries to be that second striker in the box, which we've tried to help him do.

"He's a real goal threat and it was great for him to get the first goal of this campaign as he's deserved that with his preseason form."

"When you play a team like Oxford that try to have a lot of possession in front of you and with what we faced in preseason we're ok for them to have the ball and wait.

"When it's 1-0 there's no real need to go chasing and it makes us difficult to break down. Our experience was good and players like Tafty (George Taft) who's 21 and playing his third league game today was I thought absolutely fantastic. 

"I think there was some very good performances out there but I know we can get a lot better out there."

"We're probably a little low in numbers this year, but I think we're just a little bit higher in quality and energy.

"There's not a lot of teams who can bring on the likes of Adam McGurk, Billy Kee, Shane Cansdell-Sheriff and Matty Palmer, so we're pleased with what we've got."

"It's no easy place to come first game of the season, but I would say this is one of our more favourite places to come and play after last season.

"That took away the fear factor, but nevertheless I think we had to dig in and do the right things."