THE CONCRETE ROUNDABOUT (TCR)

THE CAZBAR BIG GAME PREVIEW – TRANMERE ROVERS
Pop goddess Toyah once sung “It’s a Mystery”, and to a large degree that best describes the “Vision in Blue” on Saturday at the home of Hollywood’s favourite football team, Disney FC…. (Visions in Blue was an Ultravox song by the way).

It’s getting on a week later and many of us are still trying to get our heads around what happened as it really came from nowhere, as there certainly was not even a hint of it in pre-season.

Whilst I say it’s a mystery there are probably a few indicators that perhaps we should have picked up on, and I’ll try and touch on some before we move onto the business in hand which is of course Tranmere Rovers at home on Saturday, but before then, the million dollar question is, can we replicate that again against Tranmere and in future games.

I for one and I’m not alone in this and probably got caught up in the hype from the media circus that surrounded the fairy story of the fall and rise of Wrexham FC.

15 years in the wilderness, Hollywood backers, a fairly successful pre-season in the USA, and apparently pots of cash to throw at the cause and the regeneration of the Racecourse ground, to some degree we all fell for it, and probably more importantly the Wrexham players and fans believed it as well, and I’m pretty sure many thought they only had to turn up, and that includes us….. I know its hindsight, but they looked very nervous once the game kicked off and we took full advantage in the first 10 minutes, by then they knew they had a fight on their hands.

One or two ventured in the buildup that we were playing them at about the right time although it never felt that way when the fixtures were announced, at the time it felt like a cruel baptism for us in life back in LG 2. One of the reasons deemed to be just the right time was the unfortunate injury to goal machine Paul Mullin who has scored a staggering 79 goals in 97 appearances since joining the Welsh outfit from Cambridge Utd. Whether Mullin would have made the difference will never be known, but I don’t think so, like the other Red Dragons players, he may have found the MK defence a tougher nut to crack than some of the cannon fodder in the National League where he sharpened his claws.

Since the game I note that Wrexham fans have questioned the pre-season tour to the USA and the possible impact of jet lag and again who can say with any surety, but one thing we can say is the superior fitness of the Dons was a credible factor as Wrexham failed to cope with our intensity and physical presence, and that’s something I never thought I would be commenting on. GA mentioned in his post-match presser that he had tried to kill them in training, and his policy of a full training session before all of the PSF’s seemed like madness at the time, but it seems like it paid dividends, I do though wonder what will happen when oppo teams match our levels.

Another thing that became apparent was how dangerous Leko and Eisa are going to be at this level as they brushed off defenders that were boasting just 2 dropped points at home last season with consummate ease. In fact, we could heap praise on them all as they largely schooled the title favourites.

Wrapping this look back at the game up, there are still two burning concerns, how we conceded and that was largely down to poor to average clearances from us, and the bench looks well light, we need to get in recruits for when some of this lot get injured or suspended, also in the current state, some of these are going to be playing twice a week, that is not good for our league campaign. But finally on a positive note I hope we can maintain the high standard we have set with our delivery into the box, the first goal came from a hard to defend ball by Robson, and the corners every time were dropped into the danger areas…long may it continue.

Finally on Wrexham, well they will lick their wounds and reassess a few things and will likely dip into the transfer market and come back strong, they won’t be far away at the end of the season.

Moving on then…. Tranmere Rovers on Saturday who finished 12th last season with a record of P 46, W 15, D 13, L 18, GF 45, GA 48, Pts 58. On Saturday they lost the season opener on home turf at Prenton Park 2-1 to Barrow in a game where they enjoyed 64% possession and 17 shots with just the 3 on target.

Kristian Dennis is likely to be the dangerman having signed from Carlisle in the summer with a 21 goal season under his belt, although I noticed he never came on until the 82nd minute on Saturday so he might not be a 100% fit just yet. If he does feature expect to see him closing the defence down and chasing lost causes as well as being a danger at set pieces using his 6ft 1in frame. Aged 33 he has been a prolific scorer albeit at a fairly low level scoring 220 goals in 504 appearances.

The gaffer these days at Tranmere Rovers is Ian Dawes who is someone I don’t think we have crossed paths with before as he only took charge in March 2023, but he did have two brief stints as a caretaker before taking the job permanently. He has had 2 previous appointments at Maltese club Floriana and Bangor City in the Welsh leagues (Cymru North), who you might not know, no longer exist having resigned their league status prior to the 2022/23 league campaign, well I say they don’t exist, there was a breakaway club formed in 2019 by the supporters called Bangor 1876, and they achieved promotion last season to play in Cymru North this season….I wonder if they are claiming the history of the former club ?

For the record his managerial stats stand at P 64, W 26, D 12, L 26 giving him a Win Ratio of nearly 41%, but that halves dramatically to 20% during his time at Rovers.

Historically we have a slight edge against Tranmere with a record of P 19, W 10, D 2, L 7, although we have failed to win any of our last 5 meetings, including the last clash that saw Paul Tisdale lose his job after a 3-1 home defeat and almost before any of us got home from that game Russell Martin was installed as our new manager.

The full record of the Head 2 Head’s is shown below.

2004/05 – Tranmere 2 MK Dons 0
2004/05 – MK Dons 2 Tranmere 1 (Edds 2)
2005/06 – Tranmere 1 MK Dons 2 (McLeod 2)
2005/06 – MK Dons 1 Tranmere 2 (McLeod)
2008/09 – MK Dons 1 Tranmere 0 (Gallen)
2008/09 – Tranmere 1 MK Dons 1 (Leven)
2009/10 – Tranmere 0 MK Dons 1 (Ibehre)
2009/10 – MK Dons 1 Tranmere 0 (Puncheon)
2010/11 – Tranmere 4 MK Dons 2 (Leven, S Baldock)
2010/11 – MK Dons 2 Tranmere 0 (Powell, Ibehre)
2011/12 – Tranmere 0 MK Dons 2 (Ibehre, S Williams)
2011/12 – MK Dons 3 Tranmere 0 (S Williams 2, Gleeson)
2012/13 – Tranmere 0 MK Dons 1 (Gleeson)
2012/13 – MK Dons 3 Tranmere 0 (Lewington, Gleeson, Potter)
2013/14 – Tranmere 3 MK Dons 2 (Powell, Banton)
2013/14 – MK Dons 0 Tranmere 1
2018/19 – MK Dons 1 Tranmere 1 (Aneke)
2018/19 – Tranmere 2 MK Dons 1 (Agard)
2019/20 – MK Dons 1 Tranmere 3 (Reeves)

On Tuesday we played Wycombe in what I personally thought was a dull affair and the polar opposite from Saturday. We had a few chances but couldn’t breach their defence and eventually the Chair Boys took control winning 2-0. In honesty it’s no bad thing, the fewer distractions we have this season the better, the league has to be our priority. Our opponents on Saturday meanwhile needed a penalty shootout to overcome a young Barnsley side away at Oakwell. The game finished 2-2 with Barnsley equalising in the 98th minute, but Tranmere ran out 7-6 winners on penalties.

Looking back to last weekend’s results there were one or two surprise scores including newly promoted Notts County being humiliated 5-1 at Sutton, not to mention hot favourites for relegation Crawley beating Bradford 1-0, and Harrogate winning away at Doncaster, rest assured it will take a few weeks if not months to get a clear picture.

The situation with Darragh Burns continues to confuse, there were rumours he had returned to Ireland in a likely transfer, but there are suggestions now his return is for personal reasons, and I also note the club wished him a Happy 21st Birthday, I’m sure we will find out later this week.

Betting – Well I’m not shocked we are favourites but if you fancy we have turned the corner, we are juicily price.

MK Dons 9/10, Draw 27/10, Tranmere Rovers 15/4

Prediction – As sure as I was we would lose to Wrexham, I am sure we will beat Tranmere, make of that what you will.

As usual I will leave you with a little something to ponder, do you remember our first game in the Championship where we ripped Rotherham apart at the New York Stadium, I wonder how we finished that season.

See You Next Time.

WD

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Read the MELTDOWN after every game, no bullshit, just giving it straight

Nice Preview WellDon.
COYD!

great review as always nice one. with us playing tranmere tomorrow had me thinking. when the game kicks off.i reckoreckon i would be the only one in the stadium that watched the match in 1961 when tranmere had there record defeat 9-2 against queens park rangers. i was 15 at the time. having been born and bred around shepherds bush and a rangers fan.

Good read as ever thank you.