OXFORD United admitted that they did consider switching the kick-off time of next Saturday's Division 1 game against Tranmere Rovers at the Manor Ground because it clashed with England's Euro 2000 qualifier against Bulgaria at Wembley.

But they decided against it because they believe most of their supporters prefer a traditional Saturday 3pm start.

More than half of the Nationwide League clubs have moved their games to Friday night, to Sunday or switched their Saturday kick-off time to 12 noon.

But United secretary Mick Brown said: "When we did it once before it was a disaster.

"We've also got visiting fans to consider and, although there probably be won't many of them, they still need to be considered. They probably don't want to have to get up at the crack of dawn to get to Oxford for 12 o'clock.

"Similarly with switching to a Friday or a Sunday, it's something we did think about, but we believe most of our supporters prefer the traditional Saturday 3 o'clock kick-off."

Brown added it was only recently known that United's game would go ahead. Tranmere had two Division 1 games postponed last month because of international call-ups, but they now have just two internationals in their squad, not the three required to call games off, following goalkeeper Steve Simonsen's transfer to Everton.

United's secretary had sympathy, he said, with those Oxford fans who enjoyed going to watch England games at Wembley, but who wouldn't be able to see both Glenn Hoddle's men and the U's next Saturday.

"I think it's scandalous that the FA go ahead with England matches when there's a full Football League programme," he said.

"I wrote to the FA about it when there was an England game at 6pm on a Saturday, but got short shrift from them.

"The Football League also made representations for them not to do it, but they've still gone and done it. International matches are causing more and more problems for League clubs."

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.