Contract extensions for Assal and Rudoni should be priority for AFC Wimbledon CEO Joe Palmer

BY DAVE HUNT-JACKSON

AFC Wimbledon finished this strangest of seasons in the unexpected – and at times highly unlikely position – of not needing anything from their final game at Lincoln. And it showed.

With the home side already assured of a League One play-off place it produced the tamest of draws although Ayoub Assal added yet further to his stock with a tenacious display.

He is a nightmare for defenders, combining a never-say-die attitude to considerable pace and skill. Extending his contract and that of Jack Rudoni should be very high on CEO Joe Palmer’s to-do list.

Hanging on to top scorer Joe Pigott will probably prove impossible with the striker out of contract, although the recent displays of the now fully fit Ollie Palmer make Pigott’s likely departure somewhat easier to bear.

Only one loanee, George Dobson, made Sunday’s starting line-up but so instrumental has he been in the Dons’ recent upsurge in form that he may now be beyond their means to sign. If so he will be sorely missed as the man who, with Alex Woodyard, makes the Dons tick.

Nik Tzanev and Matthew Cox seem to have solved the perennial goalkeeping problem and clean sheets are now becoming the rule, rather than the exception.

So Wimbledon are in a rare position going into head coach Mark Robinson’s first transfer window. Not only are there unlikely to be the wholesale changes so often seen under his predecessors, but much more important will be keeping the squad intact than adding to it.

No-one knows better than Robinson what treasures may be awaiting from the academy that produced both centre-halves for Sunday’s match – as well as Assal and Rudoni. There is finally a philosophy at the club that fully embraces the value of homegrown talent.

It’s strange that after two members of the Crazy Gang at the helm it has been Robinson, who was watching Chelsea when the likes of Wally Downes and Glyn Hodges were gracing the hallowed Plough Lane turf, who has seemingly restored the ‘Wimbledon Way’.

Surely there can seldom have been a more anticipated season that the one we now await.

The Dons have an exciting, young and talented squad that have showed in their recent performances against the likes of Accrington and Ipswich that the only way next season is surely up. Add that to a near 15-month absence of live football and throw in a brand spanking new stadium in Plough Lane and the first home fixture next August cannot come too soon.

With all that to look forward to we can perhaps forgive the rather dreadful draw at Lincoln and be grateful that at least it was behind closed doors, which is where it very much belonged.

STAR MAN
Ayoud Assal. Boundless energy and fought for every ball as if his life depended on it.

BEST MOMENT
The final whistle.