Mohamed Elneny feels that our 3-0 victory over Oxford United will only build confidence heading into the weekend’s north London derby.
The Egyptian midfielder headed home Fabio Vieira’s 64th-minute free-kick to finally end the hosts’ resistance at the Kassam Stadium, and set us on our way to a spot in round four against Manchester City.
However between now and then is the small matter of Premier League fixtures with Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester United, and he believes that this hard-fought victory will increase belief in the camp going into a big few weeks.
Speaking post-match, Mo said: “We knew that today was very important for us to win because we have a derby in the next game, and we go there with the confidence to win away from home and we’re into the next round.
“We know it’s a special game for all of us in the derby, and we go there full of confidence and we’ll go for three points.
“We knew it was going to be a tough game today because for [Oxford] it is one game of the season and it is something big for them. That’s why they gave everything in the game, and we had to manage this and come here to win to go through to the next round.”
Oxford kept us at bay for over an hour as they hung in the tie, and Mo admits that there was some annoyance within the ranks at half-time that we had failed to break them down and create a clear goalscoring opportunity.
But a change in tempo at the start of the second half turned things in our favour, which culminated in Mo powering home a rare header to get the goal the play merited.
“I think we were frustrated because we knew we were playing good but we just missed out on scoring a goal,” he added. “We dominated the game and everything but we just couldn’t score. We corrected some things and then in the second half, we did it and won the game.
“Of course, I’m happy to score and help my team to win the game. For me it’s special because this club means a lot to me and to score for this club is something really, really good.”
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