IT WAS mission accomplished for Oxford United as they earned the draw they needed to progress in the Leasing.com Trophy with a game to spare.

While the 5-4 defeat on penalties saw opponents Portsmouth top the group with the bonus point, Rob Dickie’s 91st-minute equaliser was the key moment.

Matty Taylor had opened the scoring for a strong home line-up, but the visitors – whose goalkeeper Alex Bass was the stand-out player – came from behind to lead.

Robinson was pleased overall and plans to experiment in the final group game at Crawley Town next month.

“We got the point we needed,” he said. “The objective when you come into these competitions is to qualify from the group and if you can do it in the first two games it’s brilliant.

“We can now play a really young team at Crawley.

READ MORE: Oxford Utd 2, Portsmouth 2

“I’m really pleased we showed a bit of fight towards the end to not lose the game, because it could have been so different if we hadn’t got that goal.”

United looked set for a comfortable night after Taylor’s opener.

But after being pegged back by Brad Lethbridge they could not find the cutting edge which had been present in recent league games.

While Bass made several vital saves, Rob Hall felt the hosts should have been more ruthless.

He said: “We wanted to finish top of the group, so it’s disappointing.

“I think we would have felt worse if we weren’t creating the chances.

“We were getting in good positions so to not finish it off is frustrating. I think it was apparent that was our problem.”