When I commuted into London for work; I convinced myself of three things – that the commute was an hour each way when it was nearly two, that there were no jobs outside London when there were plenty, and that the journey gave me the enriching gift of time, which I could use to read as much as I like.

Commuting is like being trapped in a bubble with thousands of other sallow souls. This abundance of dead time allowed me to dig into the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I figured I could take myself off to a fantastical land and indulge in the deep well of Tolkien’s lore. 

There are points in the story where we’ll follow a character who is standing by a tree, most likely they’ll might have three names, one from each of the magical peoples they’ve encountered in their life. We’d veer off into their family history and focus on a bag they’re carrying, which had previously been owned by another incidental character whose history and significance needs to be explained in full. This was all before the pages long history of the tree itself. Thirty pages are dedicated to a group of trees having a chat.

I would find myself drifting through the pages, absorbing little of the detail until, eventually, I’d snap out of my daydream to find I was fifteen pages on and that we were still just talking about a bloke standing next to a tree.

As our own multi-dimensional cinematic universe veered towards its conclusion, Watford came to town. After last weekend’s warm weather, it felt like we were back in mid-season as the temperature dropped and the wind picked up. Just before kick-off the rain cascaded down before stopping never to return, it was like someone in the special effects department had accidentally miscued their entrance.

The home game against Watford last year was similar; spring-like but with a chill and a brooding sense of tension. I’m not sure Watford fans felt the same way, they’re set for their fourth perfectly acceptable mid-table finish and their fans seem utterly bored of it all. It’s like they fire managers just to keep things interesting; twelve since the start of the decade, only two have managed more than a season’s worth of games. The only surprise is that Gary Rowett isn’t one of them.

Even that level of madness has become boring. If Watford were Lord of the Rings, it would be the story of four hobbits travelling to Mordor, booking into the Premier Inn six miles from Mount Doom, enjoying the buffet breakfast before heading home with the ring still in their pocket.

They appear wearing an away kit of blue and silver; their ‘Elton John special edition’ kit, apparently. Hopefully, Oxford won’t take heed, I’m not convinced a Timmy Mallett Pinky Punky commerorative kit would sell. The shorts are enormous; fluttering in the wind like the flags that baldy divorced racists in black bomber jackets put up at roundabouts because, of all the things you could do on a Saturday, that’s the best they can think of. 

Further investigation proves that the voluminous shorts are deliberate; they’re described as being ‘comfy’, which probably sums up the apathy. It’s also made of ‘bespoke polyester’ which is like eating at a ‘gourmet Greggs’ or driving a ‘classic Dacia Duster’.

In 1998, we managed to pack our home kit for a trip to Vicarage Road. Because of the obvious clash, we had to wear Watford’s blue and silver away kit. Later that season, they returned the favour when they were forced to wear our shorts and socks at The Manor. Eagle-eyed Oxford fans might have spotted their choice of kit yesterday as a troll; but I suspect Watford are too bored of their own existence to have meant it deliberately.

By comparison, we’re lean and alert, still fighting, wary, frightened and determined. A driven free-kick after 19 minutes eventually drops to Miles Peart-Harris who has time to phone his mum to tell her he’s about to score his first Oxford goal at home before poking home.

It takes a little while to realise that the goal has opened up a malignant sore, after West Brom, Blackburn and Leicester, Watford fans are the latest to use us as a benchmark against which failure is measured. Their fans sing mockingly and are heading for the snack bars long before Will Lankshear narrowly avoids adding a second. If they’re disappointed by their team’s performance, wait until they taste the Homity pies. 

For all our misfiring transfer work over the last couple of years, in recent weeks we’ve looked like a side who finally look comfortable at this level. It’s an over-simplification to say we’ve got the right players in the right places, but Matt Bloomfield has finally made all the jigsaw puzzle pieces work.

Suddenly, we’re all over their dead corpse of expectation; pressing them into mistakes, creating chances and winning corners. We have so much possession and territory, we don’t know what to do with it all. We’re like a teenage lottery winner blowing all our money on cars, drugs and hookers before being declared bankrupt; it’s a lot of fun but it can’t last.

It doesn’t, Bloomfield switches to a back five and we beckon them on. It works, but maybe not how it was intended. They press forward and fashion a couple of half-chances which are enough of a scare for half the Oxford fans to soiling themselves. But, as they advance and we retreat, a big space begins to open up behind their defensive line. For all the risk of defending, there’s a reward if we can claim it.

A casual sideways pass fails to reach Kevin Keben whose half-hour substitute appearance has personified their drift. Mark Harris, usually a man of casual means, is alert and flies onto the stray ball touching it beyond Keben into the expanse of grass behind him. There’s a wealth of space and thinking time between him and the goal. At least he has Will Lankshear, who’s heading to the back post, in anticipation of a cross. Anything with pace across the six-yard box will either be tapped in by Lankshear or deflected in by one of the defenders. Harris chooses neither, driving the ball beyond the keeper into the net.

The purity of the strike and its no-fuss straight line trajectory makes the release palpable. Plus, it’s Mark Harris, Sparky, or Sparks as Bloomfield calls him; the personification of our promotion celebrations whose tortured, thankless role, which has been punctuated by crucial moments of success, is symbolic our Championship experience.

For two minutes we indulge in a warm bath of safety, for today at least. The first time at home that we win by a two-goal margin. The cheers are accompanied by a low bed of boos; Watford fans’ final tribute to their players before heading for the exit. They’re not fit to wear the shirt, even a bespoke polyester one.

Leicester lose, but Portsmouth deflect an unlikely winner in the eighth minute of injury time to beat Middlesbrough. The central narrative is that we’re timing our run to survival, but the tangential story of Portsmouth’s recovery and Leicester’s collapse skews the outcome. Pompey have a game in hand, but a difficult run-in, Leicester are on the edge but have quality and Gary Rowett. They both play each other next week. West Brom and Charlton seem safe, but could be being sucked in. Another week of messy drama passes and the computations are completed; in the end, we’re just standing by that damn tree wondering where we’ll go next.