Match Report:
Bradford City 0
AFC Wimbledon 4 (Abdou 14, Barcham 59, McDonald 65, 80)
Saturday 27th January 2018 | Sky Bet League One | Northern Commercials Stadium
The Bantams slipped to a heavy home defeat at the hands of AFC Wimbledon with three second half goals ensuring victory for the Londoners. In slightly controversial circumstances, Jimmy Abdou gave the visitors the lead and early in the second half Dominic Poleon had an equaliser chalked off for a very late offside decision. Andy Barcham doubled the Dons' lead just before the hour and a Cody McDonald brace completed the scoring.
City started the game reasonably well and former AFC Wimbledon man Dominic Poleon forced George Long into a comfortable save and against the run of play somewhat, the visitors took the lead shortly afterwards.
In fairness to Lyle Taylor he showed determination to try and keep the ball in play and create an opportunity but although on first viewing it looked as if the ball had gone out of play, play continued and Jimmy Abdou recieved a pass before curling a low shot into the bottom corner past Rouven Sattelmaier just before the quarter-hour mark.
The first half was very evenly contested and the Bantams came a matter of inches from levelling things up midway through. Callum Guy grew into the game at right-back to put in a decent display and after delivering a dangerous cross from the right-hand side, Dominic Poleon was close to connecting with the ball at the far post with an attempted diving header.
Poleon was involved in another moment of controversy early in the second half, the first of course being the Abdou goal. Paul Taylor fizzed a dangerous cross-shot towards goal and Matthew Kilgallon's touch helped the ball into the path of the City forward who buried the ball from close range. The game was seconds away from a restart and then the referee and the linesman came together before chalking the goal off for an offside decision, leaving the home supporters furious.
Clearly the moment in the game that the outcome hinged on, down the other end just before the hour mark the vistors doubled their lead. Cody McDonald did well to engineer a pass to Andy Barcham and despite having the angle against him, he still managed to see a low shot find its way into the back of the net at the near post.
Kai Bruenker and Matthew Lund came on in a double substitution for their debuts for the Bantams but just a few minutes after their introduction, Wimbledon scored their third goal. McDonald was a nuisance for most of the afternoon and after getting the better of Nathaniel Knight-Percival on the left flank, he got into the box before seeing a relatively tame shot find the net.
Matters got worse for City with ten minutes left on the clock when McDonald scored his second and Wimbledon's fourth of the afternoon. This time, with the Bantams pouring forward in search of goals, the visitors broke quickly on the counter attack and Joe Pigott's through ball found the Dons forward who slammed the ball past Sattelmaier.
Jordan Gibson came off the bench late on and caused the visitors some problems. One of his first involvements saw him get the better of his man down the left-hand side before seeing a low angled drive clip the outside of the post.
Although Gibson saw a fierce attempt go comfortably wide of the target in added time with Wimbledon camped in their own third of the field, the outcome of the game was long settled at that stage. So, it turned out to be another tough afternoon to take and another hugely bitter pill to swallow for Stuart McCall's men. All attention now turns to trying to bounce back at Oldham next weekend.