Recurring feelings of MK Dons' tattered season left along the M6

When the plan for this season was being drawn up, none of the early drafts would have had MK Dons sitting 15th in League Two in the middle of February.

Driving 237 miles home from Barrow on Tuesday, and indeed Wednesday, I was given an uncomfortable flashback to something I felt, and indeed wrote about nearly two years ago: that Port Vale game.

It was at that stage, I felt the game was up that season. I, and pretty much everyone else associated with Dons, felt robbed, cheated and denied a season which was promised to deliver so much. That one ended in relegation. And we were angry.

On Wednesday, driving the same miles down the M6 as I did from Vale Park in 2023, just a few weeks removed from doing effectively the same midweek trip back from Fleetwood after effectively the same 2-1 midweek defeat at effectively the same place in the far reaches of the north of England, I wondered whether I was feeling effectively the same things all over again.

The similarities are concerningly familiar. Heading into the new campaign, off the back of a blown play-off attempt, Dons promised big, but started the season badly. The side needed time to transition after a big summer window, and the man in charge changed. Things looked up initially, but then spiralled.

I’m not suggesting the outcomes will be the same this season. For the record, I don’t think MK Dons will get relegated to the National League. But there are worrying issues afoot, notably the nine defeats in the last 13 games. The team, which on paper is made up of some of the most dangerous players in the division, simply is not working together on grass. There have been some promising performances in there, scattered in periods, but there have also been some rubbish ones too. And I mean rubbish.

When sides go on a losing run, they often call it a blip. The concern at the moment for Dons is that their winning run under Scott Lindsey, which saw them win six in a row in League Two, is actually, on the face of the whole season, looking more like a blip than the norm.

This is not meant as a slight on the head coach, or indeed the players, but the message delivered. This team is not capable of winning promotion, and it probably never was. The narrative at the start of the season was that promotion was on the cards. It was the dream we were all sold, and all eagerly bought after what had been a pretty emphatic end to the last campaign.

Money had been chucked at the problem, the squad (on paper) was put together, but it never worked. Lindsey got a little tune out of them, and that pre-season message grew louder. People began to believe the hype again. Few could have predicted though, when Tom McGill let slip the ball between his legs against Gillingham in mid-December, where it would lead.

At the moment, Dons are confusing to watch. They’re not playing out from the back, but they’re not NOT playing out from the back, and get into trouble when they try it. They’re slow to get forwards, but quick to come backwards. They’ve got ample fire-power, but at times can’t find the ammunition, let alone the trigger... sometimes the gun entirely.

“This is just where we are,” Lindsey told us stood on the touchlines in the Lake District on Tuesday. Both literally and metaphorically, it was cold, dark, and pretty miserable.

Maybe the summer takeover did more to impact the on-field side of the club than we care to think; maybe the side does need time to gel properly and maybe things will still come good this season; maybe Lindsey needs a pre-season to properly get his claws into this team and drag them, just as he did with Crawley last season, to League One. But maybe the narrative has to change as well.

Outwardly, Lindsey and the players are unlikely to be seen to throw in the towel on the season with 16 games to go. Inwardly though, whether we like to admit it or not, footballers and coaches know more about football than any of us onlookers, and they will surely be seeing the same signs we all have, and probably saw it long before we did too.

So what does it mean for the rest of the season? This squad needs to find it’s tune, that is for sure. Lindsey has experimented with a different formation in the last few weeks with a shortage of centre-backs, potentially offering a different string in the bow, while getting players like Dan Crowley, Joe White, Alex Gilbey and Liam Kelly all on the same page has also proven to be tough in the centre of the park. Too many cooks and all that, but if they can find a way before the season is out, next season could offer more promise. This one feels like the dream has up and left it.

The players on the books for next season are all there, it does not need a monumental reshuffle again in the summer, so they can hit the ground running - something Dons have not done for a long time. A massive pre-season awaits for Lindsey and his staff to get the players in a condition they feel fit to fight at the sharp end of the table.

For now though, this is just where we are.