John Mousinho atones for stoppage-time own goal by scoring winning penalty

Posted Thursday, August 12, 2021 by PA

John Mousinho went from zero to hero as he scored Oxford’s winning spot-kick against former club Burton after his stoppage-time own goal had forced the game to penalties in the first place.

Oxford looked to have won it with five minutes left when Nathan Holland opened the scoring but former Burton skipper Mousinho put through his own goal six minutes into added time to make it 1-1.

Burton duo Lucas Akins and Thomas O’Connor both missed in the shootout, allowing Mousinho to atone by securing a 4-2 success.

The hosts had the better of the chances in an even first half against an Oxford side showing eight changes to Saturday’s draw at Cambridge.

Skipper John Brayford twice went close to breaking the deadlock, seeing a looping header beat United keeper Simon Eastwood and bouncing down off the underside of the crossbar and then latching on to a cross from Tom Hamer only to see his volley strike team-mate Omari Patrick and bounce wide.

Eastwood did well to prevent Lewis Chambers’ overhit backpass from beating him before Conor Shaughnessy was frustrated to see Mark Sykes clear his goalbound header off the line after 73 minutes.

The deadlock was broken by Oxford in the 85th minute when Holland marked his return to the club by sliding in to finish Sykes’ cross, before Mousinho’s late intervention sent the game to penalties.