“The truth is I don’t know”: Lewington on Dons’ chances of survival this season

Dean Lewington wants nothing more than to reassure all MK Dons fans the club will not get relegated, but the fact of the matter is: he can’t.

With nine games to go, Dons are just a point outside the bottom four, and though they have won the last two games, they are by no means out of the woods.

Lewington, who infamously said Dons were ‘sleepwalking’ into a relegation battle when the side last went down in 2018, said he would love to confidently claim the club will not go down this season, but admitted: “I don’t know.

“We'd all like to say we'll win seven of the next nine and we'll be fine, but the truth is I don't know. We've got good players in there, and hopefully with a bit of confidence we can come together even more as a team for the final nine games.

“The table doesn't lie, and we're in a precarious position. We've been trying to focus on the next game, at what we can control.

“Training has been going well, the boys are applying themselves well, and we'll give it everything when we go out there, and hopefully that's enough.”

Wins help breed confidence

Consecutive wins over their relegation rivals have given Dons that boost they needed to get out of the bottom four though, allowing them to begin to put space between themselves and to those now below them.

From a team which suffered four defeats in five heading into the game with Cambridge United a little under two weeks ago, the skipper said the mood has changed significantly around Stadium MK, in no small part down to the way the League One table now reads.

But there is still work to do.

“Just the basic thing of the league table looking a lot better than it did two weeks ago has helped our confidence massively,” he said. “Back-to-back wins against teams in the relegation zone is massive, and we've come out on the right side of both and it has breathed a bit of life back into the campaign.

“There's not a sense of relief because of where we still are, we haven't cracked it and there's still a lot of work to do, but it is a lot better than what it was.

“Wins are the lifeblood of players, and when you win, confidence comes back. People start wanting the ball more, they're prepared to run at people - all these sorts of things start to happen.

“We need to control that now, move it into the right direction and do the right things.”