MARK Sykes says Oxford United need to pick up six points from their two remaining fixtures – starting with Shrewsbury Town this afternoon.

The U’s sit just one point outside the play-offs, knowing wins against Shrewsbury and Burton Albion next Sunday might still not be enough.

Sykes, who’ll be a United player for another year after the club triggered an extension in his contract earlier this week, said the pressure was back on after not playing in midweek.

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The midfielder said: “It’s down to us again, the pressure is back on us – we’ve got to win.

“If we pick up six points within the next two games then we have every chance.”

Although the U’s need one of the teams above them to drop points if they are to get a play-off place, Sykes said the team’s only focus was on themselves.

“We’ve got to look after ourselves, we can’t affect what goes on around us,” he said.

“It’s down to us now, we’ve got to go out and put that performance in.

“There’s a lot riding on the games.

“If we pick anything less than the six points, then the writing’s on the wall and we’ll know where we stand.”

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The penultimate test of the season for Sykes and his teammates is a visit to Montgomery Waters Meadow to face a side the U’s beat 4-1 just 18 days ago.

“We’ll have our game plan that we always have and we’ll stick to that,” said Sykes.

“Having played them recently, they’ll know what we’re good at, and might change what went wrong for them.

“Hopefully we can go out and put a good performance in.”

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Tuesday saw play-off rivals Charlton Athletic and Portsmouth squander winning positions by conceding injury time equalisers, and Sykes said he was keeping track of events on his phone.

“Every time there was a goal, it was coming up on my phone as a notification,” he said.

“It could come down to the last five minutes on the last day – going on what happened on Tuesday night, big goals are scored in them minutes.”