AFC Wimbledon 1 County 0
Capital punishment for the 1,162 Hatters who travelled to London on Saturday
Sunday 29 January 2023
Capital punishment… that’s such a lazy headline when writing about a bad trip to London isn’t it? But take a look at that photo of our manager. That sums up my levels of creativity this morning, and I didn’t even go to Plough Lane. Wimbledon is synonymous with strawberries and cream; but chatting to a few mates who went yesterday their experience sounded more on a par with a mouldy banana and condensed milk. Hope that hasn’t put you off your breakfast by the way. However, I do have the creative juices of AFC Wimbledon’s stadium tour guide Ray Armfield and County fan Jamie Summers for you.
Back in November, many readers will have heard the devastating news regarding a lifelong County fan whose wife has been diagnosed with terminal cancer. A fundraising event, to raise money for ongoing treatment as well as supporting a young family, has been organised for Saturday 4 February at Our Lady’s in Stockport. The event sold out within a couple of days, but a small handful of tickets have just become available. Let’s get these sold over the weekend if we can. Contact details are in the image below.
Today’s edition is sponsored by The Marple Plumber Ltd, who have a fantastic offer for The Scarf My Father Wore readers, which could come in extremely handy at this time of year. They’re currently offering a full boiler check and service for just £65. Scroll down for further details, and if you have any boiler issues whatsoever, be sure to give Paul a call.
Des Junior
Yesterday’s match in one word:
Ray - Attritional!
Jamie - Depressing!
Pre-match thoughts:
Ray - I predicted a draw and would have taken one at 3pm.
Jamie - I thought it would be a tight, scrappy game that we’d have to work hard in, a lot like the game at EP back in September. I was looking forward to my first London away of the season though and a first trip to Plough Lane. I noticed they’ve been on a good run of their own, but one of the best things about County away days is we normally always have a right good go. Basically I was hoping for a last-minute Paddy winner and a couple of jars in the capital!
Post-match thoughts:
Ray - It was the kind of game we would have lost last season. Pleased to have won it though as we have Orient, Northampton and Carlisle in our next three games. Let’s see where we are after those.
Jamie - Erm… is this a family website? The sanitised version is “that wasn’t very good”. The unsanitised version is a little bit more… post-watershed, shall we say.
I’m disappointed we came away empty-handed but it’s not the end of the world. I’m more irritated that we didn’t give a good account of ourselves and it never really felt like we were going to come away with anything. Could still be there now and we’d be 1-0 down.
I thought Plough Lane was OK. It’s much like any other flat-pack built in the last 25 years, but I suppose you have to hand it to them for finding a way to get back home again.
Their organisation was crap. Not enough turnstiles open, bar service was painfully slow. But it’s a new ground ticked off at least.
Verdict on AFC Wimbledon:
Ray - To quote one of our fans, “Wimbledon were scrappy, tough, horrible, industrious and very ugly. And we won. That’s my Wimbledon, right there.”
Jamie - Shithouse team that got themselves a scruffy victory. I’m not just being bitter, because we can’t complain at them getting the win. They didn’t have a lot of technical ability about them, but they were physical, didn’t ever let the game flow with scrappy fouls and dark arts, and generally did a job on us. We didn’t wise up to them playing the margins and that let them keep control, especially in the second half. Not a fun side to play against, but they did what they do well. Fair’s fair.
Verdict on County:
Ray - Expected a bit more if I’m being honest. Solid at the back but no real cutting edge in attack. Surprised (and relieved) when Paddy Madden didn’t start.
Jamie - Bobbins. Really very bad. I thought we worked hard in the first half but struggled to adapt to their physical game. We weren’t creating anything clear-cut, but you’re thinking as the away side, if you can go in at 0-0 and have a proper go in the second half, happy days.
Then we got a penalty that should never have been given. Hippo stepped up and… well, it wasn’t his finest hour, to be fair to the lad. I couldn’t work out why he took it, and as soon as he missed, it put a bit of fire into our Womble friends.
That was a real turning point in the game. Second half they came out firing, we may as well have still been in the dressing room for their winner, and after that we just never recovered.
We lacked pace, athleticism, good game management, basically everything that has made us successful in the last few years. Paddy had a potential leveller chalked off for offside, but we never seriously threatened and didn’t look like getting anything from the game.
I don’t want to be too harsh. I’m OK with where we are generally, but this performance wasn’t the one. Everyone had a shocker.
Top Womble:
Ray - A few to choose from, but I’ll have to go with our goalkeeper Nik Tzanev. His 11th clean sheet of the season. Faultless handling and a penalty save.
Jamie - Probably their lad Armani Little. Kept them ticking over in the middle. Quite a few could’ve won awards for their play-acting though.
Top Hatter:
Ray - Thought Kyle Wootton was the type of forward we don’t have. Physical, put himself about, but lacked support.
Jamie - Can I say no one?! Hinchliffe, probably. He made a couple of brave stops in the second half; classic Ben, which is why we love him.
Atmosphere:
Ray - Livened up after the ‘penalty’ that’s for sure!
Jamie - It’s quite a neat new ground, nestled between some new-build flats and a railway line. Simple and understated, but at least from their point of view they’re back at Plough Lane.
Plenty of County in the away end for a long trip. It’s not a stadium that was built for aesthetics or atmosphere, I don’t think, so it was quite flat for most of the game. The County fans didn’t have a drum and it was difficult to create much of a sustained atmosphere, but it was decent at times.
I was reminded of Challinor’s regular comments about keeping the fans in the game. That didn’t really happen, so it did fall quiet at times.
Most of their lot were quiet as mice in the first half, but generated a decent atmosphere once they took the lead and seemed to enjoy their team’s efforts.
The group of Wimbledon fans to our left enjoyed shouting obscenities at us all afternoon though, so that’s nice.
Hopes for the rest of the season:
Ray - Is 39 points enough to keep us up?! Seriously, we may only be three points off the play-offs, but the top half is very congested. I’d still be happy with a top 10 place and more importantly to hold onto our promising youngsters.
Jamie - I don’t really know. It’s been a weird season, hasn’t it? Sometimes we’ve been brilliant and sometimes we’ve been naff. It feels like we’re having a sticky patch at the moment.
Generally I’m quite happy with where we are. We’re definitely capable of reaching the play-offs, but I’m not sure whether we’ll reach our potential. I think I’m right in saying we haven’t been above 10th all season and I wonder if that’s where we might end up staying. But we could definitely go on a run if we get our act together.
Basically, as long as we smash Crewe, all is forgiven.
The British Library receives a copy of every single book published in the UK. In the same fashion, Des Junior believes a detailed record of every County game should be preserved for the history books. So here’s the full story of our 1-0 defeat at AFC Wimbledon on Saturday 28 January 2023, as told from his three County-related WhatsApp groups…
11.11am: Stopped off at Reg’s Cafe in Banbury again. Still excellent.
12.27pm: I’d forgotten just how ugly That London is from a train.
2.10pm: Madden’s on the bench.
3.32pm: This ref is hopeless. Good decision for the penalty though!
3.33pm: That did not look like a penalty to me.
3.34pm: Fucking dreadful penalty that.
3.35pm: That was about fair.
4.12pm: Bollocks.
4.13pm: Unmarked. Miles of space.
4.15pm: Couldn't tell we had anyone on the pitch in the build-up to their goal. Time for us to wake up. These are shit.
4.51pm: No quality at all. Plenty of huff and puff, but we can’t do the very basics you’d expect of a professional football team. In short we’ve been shite and if we lose we deserve it.
10.14pm: Our poor spell seems to have coincided with Madden being less than 100%. Tanto and Stretton are both young raw talents, not fit and not genuine replacements yet.
1.18am: Walking across Mirrlees. Last week it was like an ice rink. Tonight it’s like the Somme.
Are we just having a little bit of a wobble in January or are things more serious? If you went yesterday, what did you make of Plough Lane? And can we go on and smash Crewe on Tuesday night? Leave your comments below.
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Today in SK
🎵 Following on from July’s sell-out show, the incredible Ben Ottewell from Gomez is back on stage at Bask tonight. 7pm. Tickets £18.
On this day in 2022
Not all trips to London are as miserable as yesterday. A year ago to the day, we were smashing five goals past Barnet to stay top of the National League. Relive the goals from Will Collar, Ryan Johnson (2), Liam Hogan and Connor Jennings which had the 769 travelling Hatters buzzing at The Hive. (That’s better than “capital punishment” eh?)