Interview Welcome to MK Dons – 56-pass goals and playing like Manchester City
Martin’s side perform in a style that Pep Guardiola would admire, but the next step is to translate it into more wins
An unusual thing happened in League One at Gillingham’s Priestfield Stadium this month: MK Dons set the British record, since such records began, for the most consecutive passes leading to a goal – 56. It was finished by striker Will Grigg in the fourth minute and beat the previous record set by Manchester City for a Leroy Sane goal against Wolves in the League Cup in 2017 by four.
It was not such a surprise at MK Dons, however, where a quiet revolution is taking place. Under manager Russell Martin, the former Norwich City captain and Scotland international, the League One club are passing and retaining the ball as much as some of the best sides in Europe.
MK Dons’ average possession share is 63.8 per cent, which puts them behind only Barcelona (65.1
‘It’s not a vanity project, it is because I believe it is the best way to achieve sustained success’
per cent) and City (63.8 per cent) and ahead of Paris St-germain (63.4 per cent) in fourth. In the English game, across the top four divisions, they are behind only City, Liverpool, Chelsea, Manchester United and Championship leaders Norwich for their average number of passes per game.
It is a similar story for passing accuracy, where their 82.7 per cent count is bettered only by five of the Premier League’s big guns. Among their League One peers, they are way ahead on those counts, as well as for touches per game in the opposition box.
The only problem? They are 13th with nine games to play and some distance off the play-off places. Even that recordbreaking Grigg goal came in a game they lost 3-2, “undone with two long throws and a penalty”, reflects Martin. He knows better than anyone that playing this style comes with its challenges in this, his first full season as a manager. But his commitment to dominating the ball, to high-pass counts and denying the opposition possession is absolute: he would not have it any other way. Indeed, he recalls that he told the chairman Pete Winkelman at his interview, that there would be some “pain” before it got better. Martin says: “I have been told many times, ‘Russ, they are League One players, they can’t do it, you are going to have to adapt’, and this is by people I really respect. But it is trying to find solutions without compromising on what you really believe in.” Martin acknowledges that the team’s league position will be held up as evidence by sceptics that his methods do not work in the third tier – but points out the context. Since taking over in November 2019, having finished his playing career at the club, there has been major financial upheaval. MK Dons have made £2.6million in transfers alone since the summer in a pandemic market. They have sold a host of talent including Alex Gilbey, Rhys Healey, Callum Brittain and Regan Poole. The wage bill has been cut by a third. Sixteen players have changed since the start of the season and when Martin picks the team for the next game away to Lincoln City on Friday, he envisages that it will include just one player who started the first league game in September.
A nine-year club legend at Norwich, who won three promotions with the club including two to the Premier League, Martin did all his coaching qualifications, including his Uefa Pro Licence, by his 35th birthday in January.
He is at pains to say many times in our chat that he recognises and respects other managers have different approaches. But his conviction in his way is total. Is it really viable to play the Pep Guardiola way in League One?
“I wouldn’t do it otherwise,” he says. “It’s not a vanity project, it is because I really believe it is the best way to achieve sustained success.”
His philosophy is based on his own experiences playing and watching the game. As for Guardiola, he is unequivocal. “I think he’s a genius,” Martin says. “I think he improves every player he works with. If you asked any player who they wanted to play for, if they were honest, they would say him.”
As a player, he watched Guardiola’s Barcelona as much as possible and he tries to do the same now with City.
Martin says that his style has been embraced, from his youngest players to the 800-appearance veteran Dean Lewington, and former Norwich team-mates Andrew Surman and Cameron Jerome.
“Young players these days want to know why,” he says. “We try to give them as much evidence as possible using analysis and clips.”
We chuckle about what might have happened if he had asked the same question of his old manager and friend Paul Lambert when he was a youngster at Wycombe.
We go back to the goal against Gillingham and Martin explains that the early stages of a game are crucially important for a possessionbased team because that is when the opposition have the most energy to close down and force mistakes.
“If you keep the ball away from them, slowly you diminish that energy and mentality,” he says. “You take energy out of them spiritually and physically. I have been in teams where you don’t have much of the ball, and it becomes harder and harder.”
The most difficult part this season, he says, has been convincing everyone: the chairman, the fans and the players. There were no wins in the first six league games, but gradually the results improved. The poor-quality pitch at Stadium MK, which could not be relaid in the summer, has not helped with a passing game, and nor some of the others in League One. Now Premier League clubs are looking at MK Dons as a good fit for loan players.
As for the pass-record goal, it was no fluke. MK Dons have scored a 33-pass goal against Accrington Stanley this season and another long pass-sequence goal against Oxford United.
“In the moment, you lose count of the passes,” Martin says, “but when it goes in, you do find yourself wondering ‘I think that was a pretty good goal’.”
‘If you keep the ball away from your opponent, slowly you diminish that energy and mentality’