Stanley boss backs Williamson to be a hit at MK Dons

An opening away game at Accrington was one of the hardest places to go to play total football, said Stanley boss John Coleman as he backed Mike Williamson to be a success at MK Dons.

While Shaun Whalley’s goal was the difference between the sides in Williamson’s first game in charge since taking over from Graham Alexander last week as Dons dropped to 18th in League Two, now nine without a win in the division.

There were elements of Williamson’s preferred style, which earned him plaudits at Gateshead, and Coleman said he has no doubts the new boss will be a success in Milton Keynes, but felt the Wham Stadium was a really difficult place to bring a side only two training sessions into that transition.

“Mike has gone to MK to do a job and I think he'll get it right,” said Coleman. “He plays the style of football they want, and you could see in flashes that they were good. The opened us up a couple of times.

“But if you want to play like that and pass it out from the back playing total football, Accrington away is probably the last place you'd want to come for your first go at it. But we stuck to our game plan brilliantly.

“I'm delighted with the win, and delighted we didn't sit in on the edge of our box like we have done in recent games. We were trying to go after another goal, you could see that. Consequently, they had a few balls into the box, had one cleared off the line but I don't think (goalkeeper) John (McCracken) has had a save to make.”

Dons had a turbulent week to say the least when it came to preparing for the game, with Williamson taking over on Tuesday night ahead of the trip to Lancashire. That turbulence though, Coleman said was felt in Accrington too, with their preparations impacted as a result.

He added: “It was a bit of a nightmare week for us. We had to plan to take on a team with a new manager, so we had to do analysis on MK and on Gateshead. We had to get a handle of how their new manager wanted to play. And (assistant manager) Jimmy Bell’s laptop went kaput on Monday as well!”