Four takeaways from AFC Wimbledon’s 1-0 loss at Stockport – Maghoma indiscipline so costly as Bees loanee’s absence keenly felt
BY DAVE HUNT-JACKSON
AFC Wimbledon slumped to another League Two defeat as Stockport County took all three points courtesy of Fraser Horsfall’s first-half header at Edgeley Park on Saturday.
Not for the first time in this League Two season they were outmuscled by a physical side whose numerous niggly fouls were ignored by the match officials. Indeed referee Sunny Gill’s failure to award a penalty when Josh Davison was rugby tackled to the floor in the second half was impossible to comprehend.
That said, Wimbledon were poor. An individual mistake, this time from Nik Tzanev, gifted their hosts the only goal and with a disjointed midfield that at times appeared to consist only of the excellent Harry Pell.
DONS PAY PRICE FOR PARIS’ PETULENCE
Paris Maghoma’s sending off after the final whistle against Barrow meant he was unavailable for this encounter and how the South Londoners missed him.
Despite an excellent display from Pell and a wholehearted contribution from Ayoub Assal, AFC Wimbledon were constantly overrun in the centre of the pitch. There was little or no protection for a defence that is yet to look fully secure and no-one to provide the link between the backline and the strikers. While George Marsh did his best, as he always does, he lacks both Maghoma’s positional sense as well as his clinical distribution. Without Maghoma the continued absence of skipper Alex Woodyard is a real issue for manager Jonnie Jackson.
TOWLER MIGHT BE THE MOST IMPORTANT LOAN SIGNING
Despite the massive contribution the Dons’ two Brentford loanees have already made this season, the deadline day arrival of Ryley Towler from Bristol City might yet prove the best bit of business they have done this summer. With young Jack Currie unavailable, Stockport County exploited the lack of pace on the right side of Wimbledon’s defence time and again on Saturday.
After Paul Osew was replaced at half time to allow Nathan Young-Coombes to slot into a 4-3-3 formation, the lack of pace across the back four gave further encouragement to County. There is an increasingly strong case for Paul Kalambayi to be given a start and Jackson may hope that Towler is able to add pace to his backline sooner rather than later with league leaders Leyton Orient next to visit Plough Lane.
A TOTAL LACK OF INTENSITY
Perhaps the most disappointing aspect of the defeat was the lacklustre display Wimbledon produced in front of 518 away fans. There were exceptions – Pell, in particular, along with Davison and Assal ran tirelessly with little or no quality service. Aside from those there was a noticeable lack of passion and a really rather ordinary Stockport side seemed a yard faster and a lot hungrier and were worth their win to add to just four points they had gathered before this game.
On the rare occasions the visitors attacked with purpose they exposed a slow and disorganised home defence that an on form AFC Wimbledon would have breached with relative ease. Sadly their attacking moments were all too rare.
If the Dons are to finish in the top half of the table, never mind mount a challenge for promotion, they will have to both improve on this display and do so on a regular basis. With the talent in the side this performance was really not good enough.
IT’S TIME TO WISE UP
This year’s squad has enough experience with the likes of Chris Gunter and Alex Pearce and yet they seem unable to grasp what is needed at this level. More so than in League One the standard of refereeing leaves much to be desired. Aside from missing the clearest of penalties, Sunny Gill gave a bizarre indirect free-kick after a Marsh tackle was laughably adjudged as a backpass. He also added just four additional minutes in a second half that saw Stockport wasting time throughout the 45 minutes.
This is the norm for League Two and the Dons need to find a way to win in spite of this – sad though it is they need to fight fire with fire. Game management is little more than a euphemism for gamesmanship but Wimbledon need to learn the “dark arts” and how to counter them or they will have a long season ahead with much more of the frustrations that went to Maghoma’s head a week earlier.
PICTURE: KEITH GILLARD
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Was Dave Hunt-Jackson confused to whom the home & away teams were. He talks of being physical, time wasting & “dark arts” (his quote) this was exactly what reflected the Wimbledon display. County’s striker Wootton was man handled the whole match. The Wimbledon keeper was the biggest time waster. Davison was looking for a penalty & thought he had achieved it but the referee saw through his antics falling easily in the box. One thing can be agreed on is that both teams need to vastly improve their performances with many seasoned players not meeting expectations. If Stockport were considered “Ordinary” then Wimbledon were “Distinctly Ordinary”. Yes you will always see things from your teams perspective but one thing shows since being back in League 2, if you cannot match a teams passing & control revert to using the “Dark Arts”.