The Voice - Match preview #32: AFC Wimbledon vs Bradford City Saturday 21st February 2026 3:00pm

Yes. That's OTT nonsense, from someone who needs to look around in L1 and give us half a dozen better keepers.

Often helps us win, given that we rarely have more than 1 goal leads.

 

A lot of baffling decisions in todays game

we’l start with the main one. We are playing in London, not outer Mongolia. What was the need to book a hotel far away from the stadium? Not like we’re short on choice

Then we go onto the tactics. What was the actual game plan here? Hit and hoof against a side very well capable of defending that sort of play?

I don't really give a shit about fixture congestion. Unless your hand is forced, don't make wholesale changes. In the case of Sarc and Wright, it’s justifiable, the rest weren't. zero reason Kelly should be playing in that backline, he himself wasn't the sole problem but the entire defence looks shaky with his introduction. It’s happened at Leyton Orient, Mansfield, Lincoln and now Wimbedon.

Midfield was a mess. Sibley cant run, shoot, tackle or pass

the long balls were ineffective and surprise surprise, the majority were actually targeted to the smaller of our two strikers. Not that it mattered as the midfield was half a pitch behind them, so no support either way

my stream actually went down for the second half, So I cant really comment on what effect the changes made but it seems of been minimal

we will probably stay in the Play Offs come end of season, but we wont win them. Unless we are playing at VP, our style of play is atrocious, the tactics and lineups are bizzare and our manager clearly has an alternate agenda when it comes to picking up points away from home because you can not tell me for a moment that today’s performance was anything different to any of our last 5 other defeats away in the last 2 months. Its piss poor and there’s only one man to blame

 

I agree we already had power out and if before the match we had an injury and suspension list of six players we would have had little hope.
Whichever way I look at the team selection today I can’t justify it

 

If he had any sense, he’d of kept the back line in tact, or at the very worst, put Touray at LCB and Ashby at LWB and played Pointon in the hole instead of Sibley. Its beggars belief that our manager fails to grasp the understanding that if we play 3 defenders who are poor on the ball, our style of play goes out the window and we resort to hoofball

 

One thing is Alexanders fault. Defending Corners. 61 years ago I played in the Sunday League. Our team was run by a player's Dad. He had no coaching badges but had bought the ball. He did insist that if two of our opponents went out for a corner we sent out two. Seemed sensible then and since.

Throughout his time at City one defender has been sent one to mark two at corners. We lived on borrowed time. For the third goal the Wimbledon lad had an unopposed walk into our penalty area.

I admire Alexander and he seems a quality manager. I just with he had met our player's Dad. At least it would have been 1-2 today.

 

They're hoping for repeat of the Cardiff game... hope is all you can cling too.

 

Well that was a bit different!!

Today we started off with a shite build up to the match. And then got steadily worse.

If only we could start away games after 30 minutes (not that it would have helped here) as in virtually every defeat since the start of last sesson - when we've been a goal (or more) down after then, we've lost. Only Morecambe last season plus Stockport and Rotherham, this season bucks that trend.

Note, during this spell we've only lost twice when not been a goal down after 30 minutes. Gillingham last season and Orient this one.

Quite an amazing stat.

The system is rubbish for away from home - but has still given us nearly two points a match for nearly two years. Go figure!!

 

It's a fair interview from Alexander and I do think it's one of them where it's easy to say on here start x,y and z then take them off after 60 minutes etc when you can never be proved wrong as it it never tested. We'll only know about the rotation and how it's worked when we get to the end of this busy period at the end of March. If we come out of it with a good points return and no injuries then we've done well and on the whole the decisions will be right.

What is concerning is that Alexander is now at the stage where he will publicly say that the away form is in the player's heads, normally things like that stay in house and denied in the media until things get very obvious and denying it is impossible. If it is a mental thing I really don't know how we get over it as it will only take 1 bad first half for the thoughts to come back.

 

Absolutely spot on.

 

A play off place is still well within our grasp, but Alexander needs to start our strongest 11 at home which means the return of Sarcevic, Pointon, T Wright if fit, Baldwin and our Captain now he's done his time out with suspension.

 

I'm sure he will. He's stuck to this policy all season and its worked fine so far.

 

Not just today, but he does seem slow of thinking, commitment and movement generally ...

 

GA mentioning minute management because of 11 games in 44 days.

It becomes a mute point when the rested players have to come on at half time anyway because the side was so bad

 

Kelly has come in for a lot of stick and it's probably true to say L2 is his level. But I don't think he, or whoever might have been playing the LCB position instead of him, could be blamed for any of the goals today. Was Kelly worse than Pennington? Not really.

 

Leave the pink kit behind at Plough lane would be a start....

 

Thought Kelly was the better out of the 3 today.

 

I'd like to know how many times he's tinkered with the starting 11 (especially away from home) this season then made at least 2 changes at half time, some will argue that's what good managers do when they see its not going well. where as IMO if as today you get your starting 11 so wrong you have to make changes at half time (excluding injuries) then you've under estimated your opposition or you've got your starting 11 wrong, unfortunately for me it's the latter today again.
Awaiting alexanders post match interview and how well Raynor drills him with regards said changes.

 

He can try and be clever with the squad rotation excuse but its really simple ...... ......... Play your strongest side the end