Stuffing knocked out of MK by 2-1 defeat to Accrington

With an away match loss and a slip down the table MKFC were looking for a straightforward home win today against closer to the bottom placed Accrington Stanley.

MkFC line up with lower placed Accrington today

Accrington bring with them a trickle of away fans

Mk East Stand more sparsely populated today.

Mk got off to a good start in the third min with a goal mouth scramble which they won but failed to connect effectively to stand any chance of achieving an early lead. In the 11th min, more runs from Nathaniel Mendez- Laing allowed him to get a very close shot on goal which was rebounded away by the keeper’s hands. In the 18th min, Mk’s more promising play was instantly deflated when a successful Accrington counter attack went all the way putting them one nil up. Had MK had the stuffing knocked out of them and were they going to fight their way back became the key question in the final quarter of the first half? The answer looked like yes because in the final quarter Accrington manage to push most of the play into the MK half off the pitch. A few Arrington clise shots on goal resulted in defender frustration setting in with an MK defence foul which should have been red instead of yellow. The disastrous MK first half went from bad to worse as instead of getting back into the match Accrington looked more like scoring and killing off the match. It nearly happened three mins from the half time whistle when yet another close Accrington shot on goal hit one of the MK posts. Relief for the MK whistle must have come when the referee finally blew the half time whistle and the players were able to escape further embarrassment and head for the changing rooms to a boo chorus from the less than normal amount of Mk fans who had bothered to turn up.

Two mins from the start of the second half something must have got into the MK half time drink as Mk quickly created an opportunity leading to the captain Alex Gilbey getting a shot in which went straight to the back of the net making it one all. The team half time talk from manager Paul Warne must have worked but would it stay that way for the remainder of the match? The right hand wing started to come a bit more alive in the second half with Russian Hepburn Murphy making more dangerous runs down the side creating some goal shooting opportunities for MK. However by the 10 th min of the second half the ball was going more into the MK end and Accrington were starting to create some goal scoring opportunities of their own. At times it looked like MK were just going to allow Accrington to have a bit more of the match. The Mk right hand side runs started to look a bit messy as Nathaniel Mendez started to play the right wing role as well as Hepburn Murphy. Players were running and following the ball rather than keeping to disciplined set positions, something Paul Warne needs to pick up on with his players. For most of the second half the play was even stevens, largely due to MK’s tactics and indecisive play. They finally got punished in 73 rd min when Arrington substitute Charlie Caton put Accrington back in the lead. The boo chant from the mk home end started up again for a few mins as the match moved into its final quarter. In an attempt to put matters right, Warne brought on two substitutes and rightfully took off Laing who was playing some good football but looked dubious in his role as a joint right winger. Jonathan Leko played well when put in MK’s last home match and one wonders if it was right to have kept him on the bench for this match when something more inspiring and sense of urgency was required. The substitutions in the final ten mins failed to ignite anything on the pitch. Accrington kept putting balls into the MK half to help eat away the remaining mins. MK got a corner but an unnecessary MK foul on an Accrington defender quickly put an end to anything coming of it. Leko was finally put on 3 mins from the end. He played well again in an inside right position but wasn’t given enough time to show his potential. Why? Aeron Nemane got mk player of man of the match, yet with the result and performance the way it was, one ordered if there was anybody on the pitch to deserve it. Attendance was lower than normal at 6010 but how much of this was due to the poor Accrington away following rather than early deflation of MK home support for the 25/26 season? When the referee blew his whistle a huge boo remenated around MK Stadium.

6010 Attendance