Mottingham Forest

I accept the title is a bad one, but I just had to use that at some point within the last couple of days.

Anyway, it’s nice that this week is ending with a rare piece of exciting news in an otherwise forgettable season. As the rush for tickets proves, the yoof are in the LSC final, and it will be nice to get a bit of silverware for once.

Your editor went to the arse end of SE London on Wednesday, and while we were playing roughly CCL level opposition, it was good that our lads seemed fitter, with more stamina, and had a bit of skill to boot. If only they could have netted one more goal within 90 minutes…

Are they ready for League Two action? To be honest, I’m not sure. The trouble is, they are quite small and slender looking, and you sense that if they’re put in for the sake of “we must play youth players because it’s the Wimbledon way”, they’ll get broken in half.

Perhaps literally.

I don’t doubt that a couple of them may get cameos for the dead rubber games, which we should get. Mind you, Huw Johnson got a run-out in similar circumstances in our first FL season, and I couldn’t even tell you where he is these days.

One thing from Wednesday that didn’t get picked on, which may say a lot in some ways – Seb played, and he managed to give everyone the shits with his handling on occasions in that game too.

I know Worner has received a few brickbats recently, along with a couple of “Seb would have got slaughtered for that”. Sadly, the game this weeks proves why he’s pretty likely to be looking elsewhere for a club in the summer – and why he’s only had the sporadic sniff of first team action since NA got here.

It comes to something when the post match nattering was about putting Ashley Bayes in the LSC Final, because nobody had any faith in our hero at Eastlands. And if you’re getting talked about in those terms for a reserve team fixture…

Will he quit football? His mum is very ill, apparently, and that’s going to seriously impact his outlook in life. He has his qualification that he worked hard for, and he’s clearly a bright enough lad to make that pay.

There will be many who will want Seb to have just one more game in the sticks just to say goodbye and thanks. I think we shouldn’t, because it’s pretty likely his last memory for us will be him fumbling the ball…

Speaking of fumbling – Bristol Rovers tomorrow. Your editor is making a very rare appearance as a supporter for this one, so I too can get to share the misery of too many games this campaign.

We are playing a side tomorrow with an away record of won 1, drawn 7 and lost 12. You can already picture what sort of game – and result – it’s going to be, and the sad thing is you probably won’t be far off the mark.

Which is why I found NA’s comments on the OS interesting:

Wimbledon won their last home match against Cheltenham in dramatic fashion by scoring four goals for the first time since November and Neal has called for similar attacking performances to end the season on a high.

“We’re looking for similar statistics with our attacking performance again and that’s what we’ve been trying to work towards,” said Neal.

“If we can avoid falling behind and start well then that will be a big plus. We are trying to make it about us. I always make sure we know about the opposition, but it’s about our performance levels. 

“We have three home games left and we want to try and play well in all of those.

“I think it (our home form) has played on our minds a bit and that has not helped. The fans have sensed it and the players have felt it, but the last home game against Cheltenham was an exhilarating one. 

“Hopefully we can take that into our last three home games and get what we want out of it.”

OK, leaving aside that using “hopefully” makes him sound like David Moyes, I guess even our boss has twigged that our “performances” have been too underwhelming for too long.

Either that or he was sat down and told that attendances are dropping, and therefore the club can’t grab at the wallets of those not turning up.

I’m joking – I think – but the very fact we’re talking in such negative terms about a game we should win shows just how much we’ve underperformed too many times. Especially at KM.

And to be honest, we should be comfortably safe by now. We’re not, and if we lose tomorrow and Northampton win, it’s a five point gap again. Which considering what the intention was in the close season simply isn’t good enough.

Rest assured, we are not safe yet. We are perfectly capable of getting dragged into the relegation dog fight again, and one wonders if NA himself is secretly mindful of that.

We should have enough to make it a comfortable Easter and rest of the season, but this season should have been a lot of things…

Still, at least we have our two forwards back, and we get to see Midson and Wyke team up for one last time. Since Smith has gone, they’ve been our best two up front, so if there is to be a swansong then tomorrow couldn’t be a better time.

Whether we will be set out (for once) to attack the opposition from the off remains to be seen – it’s not like the containment approach works. And Brizzle Rovers don’t have a lousy away record for nothing, lest we forget.

So, tomorrow will be interesting, although for reasons they shouldn’t be. We’ve heard a lot of talk from our management about “performance levels”, but not enough actual levels of performance. With three home games left, it’s not too late to start…

Finally,  Michael Collins has gone back to Scunny. There was always that danger with a 28-day recall clause, and it just highlights the problem with relying on loanees.

We should be OK though, and he’s been saying nice things about us on the Scunny OS. Just one thing though – what did he mean when he says we catered to his every need…….?