MK Dons narrowly missed out on the League Two championship on Saturday

Paul Warne and Alex Gilbey paid tribute to League Two champions Bromley after MK Dons missed out on the chance to get their hands on the trophy on the final day of the season.

Dons knew a win over Fleetwood Town on Saturday would see them crown champions after securing automatic promotion and top spot last weekend, while Andy Woodman’s side, who secured their League One place a week prior, needed to beat Walsall at Hayes Lane and hope for a slip up from Warne’s side.

So when Dons were held by the Cod Army at Highbury Stadium, the Ravens’ 3-1 win over the Saddlers saw them recapture top spot, a position they had held for all but one week since the end of December, to lift the trophy.

“Fair play to them and congratulations to them for being the champions,” said Dons skipper Gilbey afterwards. “They were the best team over 46 games, and well done to them.

“We’re gutted obviously, it wasn’t meant to be but that’s football. I’m more gutted for the fans who travelled all this way, but football has a funny way of coming back around. Our main objective was to get promoted, to get to League One and we’ve done that.

“Unfortunately we didn’t get over the line. We were devastated after the game. It feels like we missed out on autos or the play-offs but, look, we got promoted, we’re a League One club and back to where we should be.”

Head coach Warne added his congratulations too, saying: “We got promoted, it would have been amazing to be champions but over the course of the season, Bromley were better. I have to accept that.

“They’ve been excellent. Once they got their promotion guaranteed, they perhaps lost the eye of the tiger a little bit but you could also say the same about us. Both teams had some jaded bodies.

“All in all, I’m really proud of what we’ve done.”