Osman Sows the seeds for vital win
ROBBIE Neilson may be still meshing his new MK Dons squad into promotion contenders but he reckons the omens are good after they held on to beat Bury on the road.
The Dons led early through Osman Sow’s low shot but spent much of the first half clinging on as Bury swarmed forward with energy and creativity.
However, the home side paid for failing to take their chances as Ethan Ebanks-Landell fired home midway through the second half to secure an impressive win for MK.
“We are delighted with the way we started the game,” Neilson said.
“We passed it really well. We switched it really well against a 3-5-2 and managed to get a good lead in the game, and then saw out a bit of storm in the first half.
“We knew coming [to Bury] that there’s some good players here, so we knew that we had to be organised defensively and didn’t overcommit at times.
“The problem we have at the moment is because we’ve got such a new squad, the players are getting to know each other.
“We knew that the second goal would be key.”
The Dons opened the scoring with their first attack of the match as Scott Golbourne slipped a neat pass through for Sow and he struck low and hard past Bury goalkeeper Leonardo Fasan.
Bury generally dominated from there though and had the better of the first-half chances, and will be frustrated they were not level at the break.
A shot from striker Michael Smith almost squirmed beneath Dons keeper Lee Nicholls ten minutes after the goal and that set the tone for what was to come.
The hosts should have scored when Jermaine Beckford played Josh Laurent in just after the halfhour, but Laurent could only hit the side netting when wellplaced.
But they were punished for wasting chances as Ebanks-Landell climbed and powered in Golbourne’s measured cross. “The quality of our cross maybe is not there and also you’re not getting people to attack crosses in between the posts,” said boss Lee Clark.
“I don’t understand why players want to be ten yards beyond the far post to attack a cross because you’re never going to score.
“It’s disappointing because we wanted to continue the run.
“I still would have been disappointed with a point but you’re not going to get positive results if you defend as averagely as we did for those two goals.”