Revisiting The Manor 25 years after final whistle

"You just close your eyes and just remember what this ground meant to so many people in Oxford."

It's now been a quarter of a century since Oxford United played their last game at The Manor Ground, but the stadium still lives on in the heart of U's fans.

The football against Port Vale on that May evening in 2001 might not have been the most memorable, but the full-time whistle marked the end of a 76 year journey for the club.

In 1925, then Headington United began playing on a field next to the Bowls Club and weren't even the biggest football club in the city.

But the club changed its name and slowly rose through the leagues to the top-flight of English football. Then came the Milk Cup win in 1986.

At the core of all of those successes was The Manor, which created an atmosphere and memories that are still spoken about 25 years on from the club's move to the Kassam.

Taking a trip down memory lane, boyhood U's fan and BBC Radio Oxford commentator Nick Harris says: "[It was] a pilgrimage every Saturday to come here."

To mark the the 25th anniversary since the team left The Manor Ground, Nick revisited the Headington site where the ground once stood - which is now home to a hospital.

"Anybody who came to the Manor, anybody who supported Oxford United for a long, long time, could stand here like I do now, close their eyes and they're there."

He explains that the ground had been "all bits and pieces" before adding: "But what it did do of course was create this incredible atmosphere."

The ground was nestled in amongst leafy residential streets in the Headington suburb of Oxford.

Iconic U's manager and player Ron Atkinson once said of his first visit: "I drove down Beech Road and thought 'they can't have a football ground here, in a place like this'."

Alongside its location, The Manor was notorious for its sloping pitch - which went down towards its London Road End.

"The likes of Manchester United, Newcastle, Everton and many others hated it because it was this little ground, with an incredible atmosphere and Oxford coming down the slope at them," Nick says.

"It was something so, so special - The Manor Ground for anybody of my age is all about growing up in Oxford."

As Nick steps inside the hospital that now stands where his beloved terraces surrounded the sloping pitch, one moment comes to mind.

"I used to come up here for some physio and the receptionist said 'more people ask me for the exact spot where Steve Biggins scored that goal against Manchester United than they do to know where their eye tests are'," he says.

The goal in question was one of The Manor's most famous - with the Oxford centre-forward rising highest from a corner to knock Man Utd out of the Milk Cup in 1983.

"Almost down in front of us, I would think is where he scored," Nick smiles, whilst looking at a piece of nondescript hospital flooring.

Although it hasn't stood for 25 years, memories of The Manor still seep through Oxford's veins.

"I remember the last game against Port Vale and I was with [BBC Radio Oxford's] Jerome Sale and Mick Brown, the secretary of Oxford United at the time," Nick says.

"We were in the supporters club, and he [Mick] said 'come on' - he had the keys to the London Road and we went in there and we stood for half an hour on the London Road Terrace against the crush barrier."

"I don't think anybody hardly spoke - you just close your eyes and just remember what this ground meant to so many people in Oxford."

Since the club left The Manor in 2001, it has had a tumultuous time both on and off the pitch.

The highs of Wembley play-off final wins have been mixed in with plenty of lows - the biggest of which being relegation from the Football League in 2006.

Now with a second new stadium in two-and-a-half decades on the horizon, the club is hoping it can inject the atmosphere of The Manor into a new home.

But that will be an uphill task, as one fan told Radio Oxford in 2001 of the new Kassam Stadium: "It's been my life, it will never be the same to me - it'll never be my Manor."