Eight cup finals that MK Dons must win to go up, says Bate

Defeat to Grimsby Town on Tuesday night has left MK Dons with eight cup finals they have to win to secure promotion, according to Lewis Bate.

After going down by the odd goal at Blundell Park when Justin Obikwu converted from close range on 33 minutes, Dons missed out on the chance to climb into the top three with Stockport County not playing until Thursday.

While Dons were losing to Grimsby, leaders Mansfield lost 2-1 to Tranmere, while Wrexham and Harrogate shared the spoils in a 0-0 draw. Crewe, who play Dons on Saturday, were 1-0 winners over Sutton to climb above Mike Williamson's side into fourth spot.

With eight games to go, three of them against the sides ahead of them, Bate said Dons must win all of them.

"We've got eight games left, eight cup finals and we have to win all of them," he said. "It's a bail out that they haven't done well tonight. But we can't focus on anyone else, only ourselves.

"We now need the three points at the weekend, and then we have to go and beat the Stockports and Mansfields to take the points off them."

Head coach Williamson said Dons came up well short of their own standards when it came to their play in the final third against Grimsby, only registering one shot on target all night in Lincolnshire.

Bate echoed his statements, admitting the players were feeling very low after the loss, saying: "We're down, we wanted to win the game and it hasn't happened tonight.

"It's difficult to accept. We're at the business end of the season, and we should be winning games like these. We've got tough games coming up, and we just weren't good enough for a promotion-chasing team.

"There are no easy games in the league, but we struggled to break Grimsby down. We're the best footballing side in the league in my opinion, and we have to learn how to break these teams down. There aren't a lot of games left, so this is really disappointing.

"I don't think we got enough bodies forward, I don't know whether I got forward enough, whether I could have done more. I think we only had one shot on target, which again is not good enough. We started the second-half really well, we came at them but we just couldn't get the goal."