DES Buckingham has addressed the jeers that followed the substitution of Mark Harris for Dane Scarlett during Oxford United’s draw at home to Millwall.

The Lions were leading 1-0 when Buckingham made a double switch just after the hour mark, as Ruben Rodrigues replaced Przemyslaw Placheta, while Harris was introduced in place of Scarlett.

There was a smattering of boos aimed at the second switch, and a strong round of applause for Scarlett as he left the pitch.

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U’s head coach Buckingham said: “It’s the context of the game as well, we were 1-0 down. There is a plan, I promise you there is a plan when we speak about approaching games.

“We’ve got Mark Harris, who’s been a big part of this club over the last 12 months, certainly since I’ve been in the building.

“Bringing him on for Dane, and what we’ve got to remember, he’s a young lad and this is his first real run of games.

“We’ve played three games in seven days, we have to utilise our squad. I’ve got full trust in Dane, I’ve got full trust in Mark Harris, and as we’ve shown at the end there, if it didn’t work, we had the other option of brining Will Goodwin on as well.

“We’ve done that and managed to get ourselves back in the game. I understand the frustration, probably more because of the scoreline.

“It’s about making sure we use Dane and Mark Harris, and Will Goodwin, certainly in a three-game week.”

At half-time, Buckingham took off Will Vaulks for Idris El Mizouni, a move which saw Cameron Brannagan drop into the deeper midfield role and El Mizouni play higher up.

Buckingham said: “It was just a tactical change. We wanted to get another body up the pitch and go back to playing a little bit more.

“Cam played that role heavily at the back end of last season, and played it well, so it just made sense at the time to give us more ability to do that to be able to get up.”