AFC WIMBLEDON manager Johnnie Jackson felt his side gave themselves too big a mountain to climb during a poor first half display at home to Accrington Stanley.
The visitors raced 2-0 ahead inside nine minutes through Josh Pritchard’s opener and a stunning second from Tommy Leigh.
Wimbledon struggled to get going in the opening period so it came as no surprise when Jackson made a triple substitution after the interval.
That didn’t stop Pritchard grabbing his second of the evening within 20 seconds of the restart to leave the Dons seemingly down and out.
Omar Bugiel, one of the trio to come on at the start of the second half, had other ideas and struck twice to set up a Grandstand finish with 20 minutes still to play,
However, those hopes were dashed when Brad Hills’ 83rd minute header wrapped up a 4-2 victory for Stanley and the Plough Lane boss accepted afterwards the real damage was done in the opening period.
Jackson said: “We gave ourselves too much to do. Obviously we responded and came back into it but the first half has cost us.
“The first half was way below what standards we have set for ourselves and what we expect from ourselves.
“They were poor goals to concede and like I say, that has not been us at all.
“We had the second best defensive record coming into the game, so we have been solid, we’ve looked solid and haven’t given up much.
“Tonight it was just one of those nights where everything seemed to go wrong.
“It is an anomaly because we haven’t seen that coming. There was no evidence to suggest that was about to happen.
“Obviously we’ll have to have a look at it but I would like to think that was a one-off and just a really poor half of football that has cost us.”
Wimbledon dropped down to tenth in League Two but Jackson believes the result has to be kept in context going into Saturday’s trip at Morecambe, a side they can overtake by bouncing back with a win.
The Dons boss added: “After 15 games there is a big body of evidence here that this hasn’t happened before to us.
“Even in defeat I feel we’ve been the better team, so tonight is the rarity to be honest.
“Do you rip everything up and say we’ve got to start again? Or do you try and get better like you always do if you’ve won or lost.
“There are things that we can do in the coming days to make us perhaps be a little bit more solid.
“Away from home on Saturday we are going to need a plan and obviously we are going to have to defend better than we did tonight.”
