FORMER Town favourite Tommy Mooney has said he that regrets leaving Swindon Town to join fierce rivals Oxford United.

Mooney was a big hit in the 2003/4 Andy King Town side that lost in the Division Two play-off semi-finals to Brighton and Hove Albion, forming a lethal partnership with fellow frontman Sam Parkin.

Between them the duo scored more than 40 goals that season, with both players proving popular with the County Ground faithful.

However things turned sour for Mooney in the summer of 2004 as he negotiated an extension to his deal in Wiltshire.

The episode was played out quite publically in the pages of the Advertiser, with Mooney ultimately failing to agree terms after taking umbrage with broken promises from people at Town and the direction he felt the team was being taken by the board.

With many other clubs assuming Mooney would re-sign at the County Ground, he returned to England following his summer holiday and offers were not forthcoming for his services.

Graham Rix, in charge at the Kassam Stadium at the time, was the only one with an offer that Mooney found agreeable, but the striker soon came to wish he had stayed put.

“The move to Oxford came about a couple of weeks after I decided to leave Swindon,” Mooney told the Advertiser.

“I was very close to going abroad. The year before I had turned down offers from the MLS, so there was a possibility I could do that.

“I went on holiday for a month, then when I came back Graham Rix called me and I went and met him. I knew Graham well and he told me about the plans he had for Oxford.

“It was a difficult decision because I understood the relationship between the two clubs, but that was the only offer that I had on table in the UK and I didn’t want to move my family.

“I think everyone thought I was going back to Swindon or I had a two-year contract there – I didn’t have an agent at the time.

“Rixy talked me into it but it was really strange. The chairman at Oxford, (Firoz) Kassam, had misled Graham Rix on what he was willing to do.

“He’d brought myself and Lee Bradbury in, two experienced players, and told us both the same things. We realised before the end of pre-season that we had been misled.

“It just turned into a horrible season. It was a huge mistake because I’d had a fantastic year the year before.

“I didn’t blame Graham for it, the 10-11 players he was going to bring in had far more experience than the ones he eventually got because the budget wasn’t what he had been promised when he originally took the job.”

SEE THURSDAY'S AVDER SPORT FOR MORE ON MOONEY'S CONTROVERSIAL MOVE TO OXFORD AS WELL AS REFLECTIONS ON HIS TIME AT TOWN, AS HE FEATURES IN OUR LATEST IN DEPTH WITH...