DEFENDER Mansour Assoumani has set his heart on a career in British football, although he has an open mind about extending his stay with Wrexham.

The 26-year old centre-back earned top marks from Dragons boss Dean Saunders for his Blue Square Premier debut in last Tuesday’s 0-0 draw with Histon and is keen to retain his place at Oxford United this afternoon.

But while the French-born Mali international is enjoying his time in North Wales, he is keen to keep his options open for the time being.

“It’s been very good for me to come to Wrexham,” said Assoumani yesterday. “It’s obvious that the club should be playing at a higher level and I’m happy to play a part in trying to change things until the end of the season.

“But beyond that I want to see what is going to happen, even though I know I want to stay in this country and play in British football. The standards are good and the game here is the biggest in the world, which is why I came in the first place.”

Assoumani could have been forgiven for revising his opinion following Tuesday’s stalemate in which the visitors favoured a “route one” approach, but he claimed he enjoyed the experience.

“It was a special night for me because it was my first game for Wrexham,” he added. “We had a lot of long balls to deal with so I was pleased we didn’t concede a goal and it’s always better to be busy than simply standing around.

“The only disappointment was that we did not create many opportunities of our own, but hopefully that will change tomorrow. I’m keeping my fingers crossed I stay in the team. but the manager won’t be making his selection until tomorrow.”

Saunders, who has hinted he would like Assoumani to commit to a future at the Racecourse, has few injury concerns for this afternoon’s visit to the Kassam Stadium, with full-back John Curtis (calf strain) the only doubt.

And although Wrexham would seem to have blown their chances of making the end-of-season play-offs, the Dragons boss insisted it would be business as usual against one of his former clubs.

“I played in the old First Division with Oxford and scored quite a few goals for them over a couple of seasons,” he said. “It was a great club at the time and it’s hard to believe they are, like Wrexham, where they are.

“First and foremost tomorrow I’ll be looking for pride in our performance and we are going there to win the game. All we can do now in terms of the play-offs is to win each of our last five games and see where that leaves us in regard to the teams around us.

“It’s not beyond the realms of possibility that some of them could slip up badly enough and we have to give ourselves the best chance of taking advantage should that be the case.

“I know we are more than capable of beating Oxford and we owe it to ourselves and to the supporters to give everything we can for five more matches.”

Oxford manager Chris Wilder, who could have defender Luke Foster and striker Craig Farrell back, believes his side can still make the play-offs despite a 0-0 draw at York City in midweek.

He said: “Nothing’s changed, we still think we can do it.”