Match Report: AFC Wimbledon v Cheltenham town.

"One of these days someone is going to get a battering" is one of the oldest cliches in football. You don't normally have that feeling after being on the wrong end of two four goal maulings in a week however. So my guess is that like me, most AFC Wimbledon fans weren't expecting THAT performance.

In truth the first twenty minutes or so WAS typical us. Our skirmishes in the first twenty minutes are almost always "bloke looks at another bloke from fifty yards away then forgets about it", rather than "kebab shop punch up", this was no different. Cheltenham passed it around a bit, we ran around a bit and the whole thing was flatter than slowly drunk lager. Around the ground, discussions were just starting to veer off onto the merits of Jake Reeves chopping the man bun, Omar Bugiels impressive moustache etc when out of nothing we scored.

Alex Pearce did what he does and punted it forward, Omar did what he does and flicked it on, Ali did what he does and buried it. It was a goal of beautiful simplicity, and like when a 24 handicapper creams one down the middle and says "Why can't I do that every time?", it looked very repeatable but probably isn't. Before long we were two up, the excellent Connor Lemonheigh-Evans putting Tilley through, the wee man did the rest. Tills looked relieved to have "finally" scored one, he hasn't for about three games or something inconsequential. He should worry less, he owes us nothing.

As we took a walk around the concourse in the (as it turned out mistaken) belief that as there were less people there we might be able to get a beer, most expected a backlash from the league one team. Quick note here, the "sorry you can't have a pint at half-time unless you miss ten minutes of football" thing is getting a bit wearing now. God knows how much revenue we miss out on.

Anyway there WAS a backlash, but it came from us. Tills lashed in the third with a cracking volley, Josh came off the bench looking sharp as a tack and smashed in the fourth. Then Connor L-E absolutely broke the net with our goal of the season for the fifth. I know the season is only a third of the way through, but if anyone scores a better goal than that I'll show my arse in Elys window (let's all hope it doesn't happen).

After that they woke up a bit, Josh rattled the bar (I forgot that Armani Little did too) and Ali could literally have scored six. Unfortunately though for us and him, although he's brilliant he can only do it if someone passes to him. On numerous occasions he had a tap-in waiting to happen, only to see whoever had the ball preferring to shoot themselves. Tills did it many times (too many in my view) then Jimmy Ball did it in the dying seconds also. There's not much point in having a top striker if we don't feed him when he's in. It will probably have driven Ali mental, and it is my only criticism of what was a brilliant performance.

Anyway, we absolutely took them apart. "The gold cup, the book festival, Dom Joly (I Googled it), your boys took a hell of a beating" etc etc. Some reflection? Two defeats didn't mean we were shite, and a 5-1 win doesn't mean we're going to win the Champions League. The deep pan Bristol car showroom thing on Tuesday will run its course, but Doncaster at home next week will be a stern test. They are a good team who've made a poor start, but they ARE getting going now. I think it'll be a tight game, the fans need to enjoy this win but not get too carried away. The players might well need us to get behind them for periods next weekend, hopefully we step up.

COYD

Ivor Heller. A Dons story and how I fell in love with the club.

I'm quite good at doing pub quizzes, not answering the questions, setting them. I've been doing it for years. I guess I was a bit nervous at first, but over time much like anything else, if you stick at it you become better. These days I kid myself that the whole thing is quite entertaining, that people actually enjoy doing "my" quizzes. Secretly, I've got this little ambition that when I stop running pubs, I'll keep doing quizzes. Maybe I could have a little side-hustle doing a couple of nights a week to pay for a few beers when I've retired. I could maybe go round old folks homes for free of an afternoon, cheer em up a bit and have a giggle with them.

It's not much to have on your gravestone "He did a bloody good quiz as it happens", but at least it's something. It's my little thing, I really like doing a quiz.

My guess is that Ivor was a bit like that with the Man of the match presentation. He did it every time I went to watch Wimbledon at Kings Meadow, long before I was an actual fan. I love football, would quite happily watch two kids teams if I had the time, and on the odd occasion I took the kids to an AFC Wimbledon game, Ivor embodied (to me) what the club was all about. He doesn't (in the nicest possible way) look like your average compere, and he certainly doesn't talk like one. Just like being able to have a beer in the clubhouse and tell an actual player that he'd done well made me fall in love with it, so did the funny little bloke doing the Man of the Match too. I loved the food kiosk doing hot chips that burnt your fingers, the stewed tea served in two plastic cups which just about meant you could carry it. I squirted on the shite ketchup from the big catering bottles with glee, all of it reminding me of when I was a kid and used to go watch Scarborough with my brother. We cleared the snow off the pitch once to get the game on, me and my brother Tony. There was a picture on the front of the local paper. We had these bobble hats on that my Mum had knitted, it was probably fifty years ago and I remember it like it was yesterday. There'll be kids going to AFC Wimbledon games now that'll say the same in half a century.

Time moves on though doesn't it? They've got a plastic pitch at Scarborough now, you can probably clear the snow with a golf buggy fitted with an ingenious front attachment. It doesn't even snow like it used to, time moves on.

Time moves on at AFC Wimbledon too, and so it should. Ivor isn't any more the commercial director bod now, he's moved on and become a freeman of Merton borough. I know him enough to say hello to, not much more, but he deserves that acolode no doubt. What he and the other founding fathers of the club did has enriched my life at least, whatever else they've achieved.

I like it at AFC Wimbledon that even though time has moved on, a certain Marc Jones still designs our kit. He does a brilliant job, does it for free too, so why replace him? Similarly some people who Im lucky enough to consider friends, Graham Price, Xavier Wiggins, Danny Norris etc (I know there are countless others) give THEIR time for free and do brilliant work as well. Why on earth would we pay someone else for the incredible expertise they bring (we couldn't afford it anyway) when they do it for free? It would be nuts.

And back to Ivor. Why would we pay someone to do the man of the match when he did it so well, for free? Now I'm acutely aware that I pour pints for a living and have literally no knowledge of the behind the scenes stuff, the politics and all that. For all I know there might be excellent reasons why the change has been made. Equally, I'm aware that perhaps it's not appropriate to make that reasoning public.

See, I wouldn't ask the question on the blog (I'd stay schtum forever) were it not the case that I was told a few weeks ago that Ivor WAS coming back to do it. I was told by a prominent person at the club, to my face. Since then, I've asked around and that appears NOT to be on the agenda. So am I being fobbed/mugged off, and if so why? 

Honesty and transparency, they are things.

We've got super Johnnie Jackson.

Twenty-Nine days ago it was my birthday. I think it was probably the best birthday I've ever had, you appreciate em more as you get older. The kids came back from Uni for the day, we went to the football and watched us demolish Tranmere 4-1. Ali Al-Hamidi scored a hat-trick, and I had a fiver on it at 80/1, (I also had a few quid on him scoring twice), it was a beautiful day all round.

We went in the Phoenix after, it was one of those pinch yourself and drink in the fact that you're so happy moments. Then, a Wimbledon fan came up to me and said "Let's sack Johnnie Jackson eh?". A cheap shot perhaps, but one I took on the chin. I did make no secret of my feelings at the time that we ought to have called it quits with Johnnie at the end of last season, so I suppose someone taking the opportunity to "rub my nose in it" was only to be expected.

My reservations about sticking with a manager who had won one league game in nineteen weren't simply tactical nor results based. They weren't just that I doubted whether he could take a bunch of new players and make them a fighting unit (a doubt which he has categorically proven to be unfounded). No, my chief concern was that I think a manager needs credit in the bank, political capital if you like. My worry was/is that Johnnie had spent all of that credit last season. As soon as we hit a bad run I thought, people would inevitably turn on him.

Twenty eight days after we smashed Tranmere 4-1, Morecambe did the same to us. I hope the manager has the good sense not to look on Twitter and has not sneaked onto a fan WhatsApp group under a pseudonym. If he has, he'll know that many folks are salivating over the prospect of getting Gareth Ainsworth. The only surprise is that nobody has said "Cowley brothers" yet. Probably most bizarre of all is the fact that many of those calling for the chop are the self same people who have been going around asking where "The Jackson haters are now". It truly is as someone once said, a funny old game.

My own feeling is that sometimes in life you have to gather yourself, take a deep breath and think. This is one of those occasions. I said before the season started that if we were going to back the manager (which we did), then we have to back the manager. I wouldn't have done it myself, but that matters not a jot. All the stuff about people "wanting to be proven right" was and remains nonsense, we must take the course of action which best preserves the viability of the club in the EFL.

We HAVE a manager, one who has shown encouraging signs this season of finding his method. Yes at times we aren't the easiest watch, and yes we've had our arses kicked twice in a week, but we ARE tenth in the league. We've gotten there by being a bloody good team, managed very well by Johnnie Jackson. We did until yesterday's game have the best away record in the league (let's not talk about the home bit for now), and the team is really obviously better than last season. Craig Cope has recruited well, and the players don't look (to me anyway) like they're downing tools as far as Johnnie is concerned.

So my call, such as it is, is that we should stick with the manager. We've hit a bump in the road, but in League Two pretty much everyone gets banjoed at some stage. Everyone has a dodgy spell, this is ours but there's no need to litter the concourse with lobbed out toys. Stick with the manager.

That's not to say obviously that the "Get out of jail free" card is everlasting. I totally disagree with those who said last season's debacle was unavoidable given the circumstances. Yes we lost players in January (which L2 club doesn't?) but we did pick up Ali Al-Hamidi and a kid who in a Leicester shirt is one of the best in the Championship. We didn't in that player turnover lose any of our "marquee, signed and on top money in the Summer" recruits (Alex Pierce, Harry Pell, Chris Gunther), nor did we lose our record signing (Josh Davison). I know someone will say "injuries!", and I know we had a lot. Infact, the "injury index" (remember that method where you add together the shirt numbers of the players who have missed games, divide it by the number of minutes, add twelve then subtract your last three house numbers) came up at 24.87 or something. Apparently that's the highest number since anyone thought of it.

But despite all the injuries, the rubbish squad, the floodlights not being bright enough, the home and away kit being too similar, the grass being too long and all the other reasons put forward, we continued to take the lead pretty much every week. That despite taking the lead each match we were singularly unable to ever "see it out" was to mind on the manager.

This season though, things have been different. Because of that, and because I'm not convinced that a change of manager right now makes sense, I think we shouldn't get trigger happy. Johnnie and the management team will know that they ain't gonna get nineteen games this time to turn it around. They'll know that an FA Cup exit and defeat away at you know who might prove very sticky, even IF we beat Doncaster in between (which is no gimme). We need results, and Johnnie needs one sharpish.

How to get one? Me, I'd be working the defence all week. They've gone from superb to shambolic in a week, let's get that sorted. We KNOW they are good players, let's do some fine tuning. I'd get Morgan Williams back off loan straight away (it was a bad idea in the first place), and I'd get James Ball into the team in a 4-3-3 formation. We are getting overrun in midfield, Tilley in the 10 slot behind the front two makes sense to me. Williams then becomes first change option, Larkin and Lemonheigh-Evans are good players but not ours. They can wait for injuries.

Most of all though, Johnnie has to look in the mirror. I'm convinced that his inability to arrest the tailspin of last season was caused at least as much by his haunted, hunted gait as it was by an injuries. He had that same look about him in yesterday's interview. He's got to lose that, get a smile back on his chops. Lift the mood in the camp don't drag it down, take the lads out for a game of golf, a few beers, a curry. 

We ARE a good team at the level, we DO have good players. We also have a manager who is obviously piecing together the kind of boss he wants to be. He deserves to be given a chance, deserves to be allowed the opportunity to turn around a worrying decline. 

So in answer to the question "Where are the Jackson haters now?" this one is still here. No of course I don't "hate" Johnnie or indeed anyone else, but I still have my views re last season. This isn't last season though, it's THIS season. We've stuck with the manager, so we should stick with the manager.

Come on Johnnie, time to prove people like me wrong again. Get us firing again 👊

Two points from the last twelve. Are the wheels coming off?

It's a fair question I guess, and one that has been doing the rounds in the Alex since Tuesday. Two points from the last twelve has quickly seen us go from "Sheesh win this and we're in the automatics!" to "Get beat here and we're looking down not up".

So should we be worried? Is it time for the Jackson "haters" (I know there never was any in the first place but let's go with it for now) to dust off the placards? Or has it just been an unfortunate blip?

The answer is probably a combination of all three. It almost always is in life. I do to be honest think it's understandable that people are concerned about our form right now, although I personally am still calm. It's true that we aren't playing THAT badly, but bad runs don't grow from awful performances. Horror shows tend to come later down the line. Like good runs, bad runs begin with a goal off someone's arse, a poor refereeing decision, a game in which the result doesn't reflect the performance. Good runs don't start with great performances either, they never did.

I thought for example we were decent at Mansfield, hard done by to lose against Bradford, solid if unspectacular at Barrow, but the three without a win turned into four and another loss with an awful first half against Accrington.

So concern is fair enough, I get it. Equally, we can hardly be surprised if that concern also brings the manager into the equation. The last time a poor run sprouted roots, it had become a Triffid and taken over the greenhouse in no time. Not only was Johnnie unable to stop it, he never looked likely to be about to get the petrol out either (it was quickly past the sheers stage). Long before the final couple of matches we had the calculators and the calendars out, only the season finishing when it did saved us from the drop.

So let's look at it and start with the defence. I personally am totally unconcerned that we conceded four goals against Accrington. Equally, I'm not bothered that the four could easily have been six. I don't care. Why? Because I KNOW we have a great defence. I've watched it all over the country this season. We have a solid goalkeeper and right back, two of the best centre backs in the league and a superstar left back. They defend and play well as a unit, totally cohesive. So much so that they even had a nightmare performance all on the same day, far better that way. They were all rubbish against Accy, they'll all know it, and it won't happen again.

In midfield, I know we have top players. Were they great against Accy? No they weren't, and neither are they collectively playing at their best right now, but they are all good players who work their nuts off. They'll do for me, although I would play James Ball tomorrow if I was doing the team sheet. I'd also consider a 4-3-3 with Tilley in the 10, but this post isn't about that sort of stuff so I'll leave it. Suffice to say we have good midfielders and I'm not concerned.

Up top in Omar and Ali we have a very potent combination, with Josh chomping away in the background. As previously stated, I'm not worried about Josh either. I hear the murmurings, but I've seen him have too many good games for us, bust a gut on too many occasions to give up on the fella now. "Supporter" isn't just a word, it's a thing. Josh needs to hear his name being sung while he's warming up, needs to feel the warm hand of supporter love again.

And Johnnie? Well no amount of "injury index" data, no "budget league table" or "we lost our best players in January" stuff will ever convince me that last season wasn't a total shit show. That said, I think that so far this season he's done an excellent job. He built the team into a fighting unit in a matter of weeks, and we've at times looked one of the best teams in the league. He has (I think it's a statement of the obvious) improved as a manager this season and by a fair margin. That doesn't mean of course that he doesn't occasionally make mistakes (the team selection in the last game was a bit of a shocker as it turned out), but by and large he looks like he learns quickly. Hopefully that learning includes a "how to get back on track" section, we'll need that if we don't win at Morecambe (which is far from an easy game). 

So in summary, I'm NOT worried yet, but we need a result. That result needs to be a WIN, not a "great clean sheet", a "really solid team performance" or any of that stuff, we need to WIN.

QUICK SCOUTING REPORT: Morecambe are a good team with a good manager. They are two points ahead of us and have played two games LESS than us. They're unbeaten in seven and have won their last four. They are essentially a good team rather than having outstanding individuals, but everyone's talking about young Michael Mellon up top, on loan from Burnley. He is very good and in time will be miles too good for the level. I really like the Northern Irish kid in midfield (JJ Mcsomething), he's box to box and has a goal in him. Josh Bedau at the back is a good player, and I think Adam Mayor is going to be a good player too. They work hard, don't mind if you have the ball most of the time, and fight till the death. If we can win there it'll be a great result, but we could really do with one.

My prediction? 1-1

My match report: AFC Wimbledon v Accrington Stanley

As we all know, you can't make an omelette without breaking eggs. And although it's fair to say that last night we crashed the lorry from the egg farm over the side of a bridge (a really high bridge, with concrete underneath), we learnt much in the process. If we use the information we gleaned, REALLY use it, we may even end up thinking that being beaten up by Accy last night was a blessing in disguise.

"OK then silly Bollocks, what did we learn?" I hear you ask. Well let's look at it, and if you endulge me I'm going to break with what has become tradition at our club and not talk about the defence first. See, if we don't have a shot in games we always talk about the "great clean sheet" and how "solid" we were. So it seems to me to be only fair that on the occasion we were very "un" solid and have a sheet so embarrassingly dirty we'll probably have to wait until everyone's out before washing it ourselves, it's best we talk about the attack.

So here goes. For twenty five minutes of the second half that was the most exilerating and penetrative attacking display I've seen from us all season. Throwing caution to the wind (you do that when you're 3-0 down) we tore into our opponents. Gone was the obsession with shape, structure (and another word starting with "S" which would make the sentence really impressive but which I unfortunately can't think of), we just went for it. Suddenly Hus Biler was checking back & sprinting sideways like one of those Madagascarn crabs dodging the waves and hungry Seahawks. Jack Currie was bulldozing his way forward, smashing through people like a drunken student trying to rush the door at Glasto. Ali Al-Hamidi's boots flared an angry orange while he bristled with anger,  and meanwhile Omar Bugiel was doing a one man tear up with a hundred MK fans in a backstreet Kebab shop, in an ugly, concrete backstreet.

The centre halves went up for set pieces and stayed in there. No more retreating the minute it looked like it might be cleared, they blocked and spoiled and kept it alive. Accrington barely got out of their half, we suffocated them with will and intent, it was a beautiful moment. And the ground rocked, they hung from the barriers and ripped their shirts off to twirl around their heads as they bayed for blood (or at least the old ladies in block 108 of the West Stand did anyway). THAT was Plough Lane at its finest, THAT'S how we should play. We almost got pinged on the break a couple of times and it was chaotic but so what? We love a bit of chaos.

At the other end? Sheesh were all over the place. Conceded four and it could've been eight. Bad day at the office. Even good players have bad days, and we have some REALLY good players in defence. No damage done, we lost one, it happens, we move on.

That attacking though....

Not an easy game, but we can win this.

I've seen it mentioned a bit that this is a good time to play Accrington but if it is, I wouldn't want to play them at a bad time. They come to Plough Lane tonight on the back of three straight wins in the league, and four straight wins if you include the football league trophy. The last team to beat them (six games ago) was Stockport, and given that they beat just about everyone right now there's no shame there. So what can we expect when they come out tonight?

Well first things first. Any hopes that they might be distracted by the public row between the owner (who wants to sell the club) and the management team are in my opinion pie in the sky. John Coleman is an excellent manager, one of the best in the league, and if anything I reckon his players will be MORE galvanized not less by the strange situation around the club. In terms of style, I wouldn't describe Accy as being "direct" but like us they aren't shy of getting the ball forward quickly. Again like us they are a big, powerful team who aren't concerned with not having posession for lengthly periods of the match. Up top in Josh Andrews (on loan from Birmingham) they have a big, ugly target man who is a huge threat when crosses come into the box. They aren't shy about crossing it either, so our full backs are going to have to get out quick and tight to encourage a re-cycle. They are also a big threat from set pieces, the monstrous figure of Jay Rich-Bagalou launching himself at anything available.

They almost always play 4-2-3-1, and have two young kids in front of the back four who put the miles in (can't remember their names). In the three in front, the Scouse lad Whalley has a goal in him & will hit it from range, and I like the Portsmouth kid Tommy Leigh if he plays. All in all they are a solid outfit and will in my opinion finish top 12. They are in that group (as are we) of eight teams which are not quite as strong as the top four (Stockport/Wrexham/Notts Co/Mansfield).

Their recent record is good, but they were in my opinion lucky to win at Grimsby where until they had a man sent off, the home team were much the better side. Grimsby missed some sitters, something we obviously need to avoid. They won at home on Saturday too, but the away team missed a couple of really good chances. We'll need to defend properly, as already stated the full backs as first line, but Ryan and Joe are going to have a battle with Andrews. I'd let Ryan have him, he's hungry for a bit of raw meat after a few quiet weeks.

To hurt THEM, if we're brave enough to press higher and not instantly retreat into our shape, I think we can catch them around the edge of their box. They kind of try and play out sometimes (particularly the full backs), I can see a goal from a counter press if we do that. And I think our wide players can cause both of their full backs problems, both of their wide defenders are more the robust than the nimble types. As they only play one up top, I hope we're brave enough to push our full backs on (Josh Andrews isn't going to outpace anyone down the sides) and if we can get Reeves/Little on the ball in their half, Ali will be on for the slide rule through a gap. He'll really bother them with his pace if we can give him some service.

I like the game, under the lights it'll be a great atmos and I think a really good match up. I take us to nudge it 2-1, and I fancy Ali to score twice (which is 10/1). COYD.

Who'd be a football manager?

Who'd be a football manager? In what other job are you told that if you provide such & such then everyone will be happy, only to discover that when you ARE providing exactly what everyone was going to be happy about, someone moves the goalposts?

And so it is with Johnnie Jackson. "Give us a mid table position and a solid team" they said. Then, when he is in the process of giving us exactly that, they say the football is a hard watch. They wonder if we could go for it more, if the ever racking up draws column is the result of perhaps a too conservative approach. They worry that our goals have dried up, that a potential tilt at comfortable top seven might be in the process of turning into a "we need to win our last seven to have a chance of the playoffs". How fickle is the football fan? How ungrateful.

People unfortunate enough to be frequent readers of this blog (and you really ought to do something more productive with your spare time) will know of course by now that by "they", I actually mean "I". I was the personification of the "mid table will do me/I don't care if we play boring football" supporter. After last seasons post Christmas calamaties, any sort of stable points gathering appeared desirable.

That was before though I'd seen the manager build a defence as solid as any in the league. Before I'd seen us cut loose and rip Tranmere apart, do the same at Sutton once we'd got the goal, ditto Colchester. It was before I'd seen it demonstrated every week what a good player Jake Reeves is, before I'd seen Alex Bass, Ryan Johnson, Joe Lewis. See this is the thing, now that I've seen those players, that team we have, I do wonder if we are entirely doing our talents justice.

Take Saturday at Barrow. It wasn't the worst game of football I've ever seen, but it WAS the second worst, (the worst was the Gillingham away 0-0 of a couple of years back, I never want to surpass that). The two games were very similar in many ways. Both played on a potato field of a pitch, a bit of rain, a bit of wind, very few chances and both teams displaying an obvious fear of getting beat. The main difference is that the draw at Gillingham as good as condemned them to the drop and gave us a great chance of staying up (one which we unfortunately didn't take as it turned out). In many respects it was a great point, ugly but vital. My contention is the Barrow one was slightly less so, not in the overall scheme of things.

So to the league this season. I've long said that League Two is an "all about the wins" league. A quick look at it this morning shows that Stockport have won nine games, the most in the league. They are top, and it's little surprise to see that the team who have won the second most (Notts County who have won eight), are second. Interestingly, both teams have lost more games than us. Indeed Notts County have been absolutely smashed up twice (5-1 and 4-1) but they still are second. Mansfield are unbeaten in 13 games which is no mean feat, have no doubt gotten many "great points" and numerous "great clean sheets", but are sixth. This league is all about the wins, it pays to go for it, risk all for the win.

And so to us. Yes we have a brilliant defence and the coaching staff deserve huge credit for that. We also though have a central midfield partnership that has scored one goal in our first fourteen matches, a left side/winger slot which has yielded one. We have as one of our strikers the excellent Omar Bugiel who has never been a regular scorer throughout his career, alongside the best striker in the league who we aren't creating for. We don't score via our centre halves from set pieces, and the full backs have one goal between them so far. It isn't difficult to see why our goals drying up has coincided with James Tilley not scoring every single week, and in all honesty we don't look like a team who is about to turn the taps on anytime soon. We are a really good team within which everyone works their nads off, hard to beat, we put a shift in etc etc, but flowing we ain't.

But we CAN do it, we CAN play expansive, expressive, brave football. I know we CAN, because I've seen it. The shame is that we've only really opened up once the game is safe, once we don't have to worry about being beat any longer.

And that's the crux of the whole thing for me. We oughtn't in my view be sooo worried about losing the odd match. We are definitely not going to go down, there is only upside to our league season. We aren't going to fail in our ambition because we were too brave and lost too often, but being too safe and drawing too many might well hold us back.

At the moment we are shooting for the middle of the green, trying to save par, make the cut. It's time to get the big dog out and try to carry the water, time to go for the pin. Fortune in this league favours the brave, it's time to don the Warpaint and go a bit more Braveheart. COYD