Dons owe Crewe a performance after Gresty Road slump

Dons' 2-0 defeat to Crewe Alexandra early in the season has been an outlier by which poor peformances have been judged since, but it's time to pay them back when they play at Stadium MK on Monday.

Two goals inside the opening 20 minutes set Dons a mountain to climb when the sides met back in September, but they never found their feet and could easily have lost by far more on the day. At the time, Russell Martin said it was the worst half of football he'd seen since taking over and it has since been the barometer for bad games. Still early in the season though, just two players who started that day started against Doncaster last Saturday.

With Crewe heading to Stadium MK on Easter Monday three points behind Dons in 15th having suffered stoppage time heartbreak against leaders Hull City on Good Friday going down 2-1, coach Dean Thornton said Dons are eager to put to bed the ghosts of the Gresty Road performance.

"I think we owe them one, they did a job on us at our gaff and I hope we do a job on them at ours," said Thornton. "From our point of view, we were really disappointed by that game. It was really early on, but I think there's only a handful of players in that team who started the last game. We've come a long way since then.

"Crewe are a very good team. Our analyst speaks very highly of them, and watched more of them than anyone at the moment because of how they play and their individual players.

"They're very strong at the attacking end of the pitch so I have to be on my toes to keep the keepers ready for the game."