Thank You and Goodnight.

So it's happened, we all knew that it was going to but yesterday saw confirmation that former AFC Wimbledon skipper, Danny Kedwell and midfielder Steven Gregory leave the club for Gilligham and AFC Bournemouth respectively.
Gregs goes to a club with everybodys thanks and best wishes and goes to a League One club that will probably be pushing for promotion.
Kedwell leaves to go to his hometown club and AFC Wimbledon League Two rivals slightly more contentiously, all because he handed in a transfer request. Just that one act alone would have cost him a few fans thanks.
Personally I'll never forget the kick that sent us into League Two and but I'll always remember that it was his last kick for the club. What a difference a month makes, after all a month before handing in his transfer request he was pledging his future to the club.
It does show just how fickle footballers can be though when it comes to money.

Jack and Reece re-sign!

Afternoon all,

good news from Kingsmeadow this afternoon that Goalkeeper Jack Turner(18) and Midfielder Reece Jones(18) have both signed new contracts!

I've been impressed by both these players when I've seen them, particularly Jones who I think has a really big future in football! You can follow these lads on twitter with Jack Turner being @Jackturner20 and Reece Jones being @reecej100.

On the down side it looks like AFC Bournemouth have finally got their man in Steven Gregory for a reported fee of 50K and Danny Kedwell looks like he's chosen Gilligham over Crawley. Still my thoughts with players that leave are if they don't want to be at our club, we shouldn't really mourn their loss, more say thanks, get as much cash as possible and move on quickly, after all, disruptive influences we do not need.

Until Next time...

Signings!

Not one, not two, not three but five! FIVE players have put pen to paper today for AFC Wimbledon.

Legendary (at 21) 'keeper Seb Brown has signed  a contract extension - was there really any doubt? He is Womble through and through!
You can follow Seb on Twitter too : @Sebbrown1

James Mulley, 22, who put so much energy into so many positions as a non-contract player last season has signed agreed terms and signed a deal today. Top stuff, this young man is a great player, bags of energy, extremely versatile and scores goals too. He was definitely one of my players of last season.
You can follow James on twitter : @JMullz10

Chris Bush is back this time permanently. He was on loan from Brentford last season and did really well for us at Left Back before being recalled to Brentford in January.
Good to see him back, at 19 he's already a quality left back and he'll do really well for us this season.
You can follow Chris on twitter : @chrisbushkin - be warned though, he retweets everything that you mention about him! ;-)

Ryan Jackson is due in to update his contract to a league one and he's a big bonus for us too. He's a tricky, speedy winger who gives full backs all sorts of nightmares, when he's on song. He was one of those players last season that I was thinking was one for the future and at 20 years old, he still is, but I think it's time for him to really step up a gear and deliver that awesome potential on the pitch.

The last player to sign today was Charles Ademeno, 22, from Grimsby Town. You may remember him scoring against us at Broadfield for Creepy back in March 2010 and we're all hoping that he can return the favour and score against Crawley this season.
At 5ft 9ins he's barely taller than me and what I have and he doesn't is a beer gut and what he has that I don't is talent, speed and strength.
AFC have themselves a good striker.
He apparently scored the quickest hat-trick in non-league history, so more of the same please.
You can follow him on twitter : @charley_boy

Dunno about you folks but I'm really starting to think good thoughts about the coming season!

Away News

I go to Wales for 3 days and the fit has hit the shan!
We get the news that Danny Kedwell wants to leave for 'personal reasons' (money probably) and if we should happen to see of Creepy in the Fizzy Piss, sorry Carling Cup we have to play Crystal Feckin Palace in the first round!
Then it was fixture Friday today and I was nowhere near an internet connection to write anything about it!! Bugger!
Let's deal with Kedwell first, citing personal reasons for wanting away from a club usually means the player wants more money or he's fallen out with the manager(Unless you're Wayne Bridge). Now as fans we'll probably never know the real reason for DK wanting to leave but we can assume that he's looking for that one last decent move before being put out to pasture, after all, at 28, he's no spring chicken. Odd though that just a month ago he committed himself to the club for this season. Now I'm an old cynic and it just reminds me what fickle creatures footballers can be. It also shows that tapping up is rife in whatever division you happen to be in. There are two teams that have been mentioned on twitter in the last couple of days, the first one was of course Creepy Crawley, it's public knowledge that them and their handful of fans are big Kedwell admirers and will probably have offered what ever DK asked for. Second team was Gillingham and it's less galling for me because rumour has it DK lives quite close to Gillingham and it would be more convenient for the player.
Should he go to Creepy I don't think even that penalty would be enough to have him forgiven because he would look like just another football mercenary.

The second event this week was the draw for the Fizzy Piss, sorry Carling Cup. Now should we go to Creepy and get a result we'll be facing old rivals Crystal Palace. Bollocks.
I say bollocks because I'm fairly certain that whilst we'll give them a good run for their money, we'll get beat at Selhurst Park and my Deputy Manager is a Palace fan, I'm in for all sorts of abuse.

New bit of news is the Signing of Striker Jack Midson from Oxford Utd, he was in the Oxford side that won promotion to League 2 last summer and by all accounts he did very well for them and their fans have wished him well. Not Kedwell then....

Fixtures coming up...

Preliminary What?

Fizzy Piss sorry Carling Cup winners, Birmingham City are getting a bye to round three apparently even though they've been relegated to the championship because of Europa league commintments.
This means that for the first time in it's recent history(2002/03 was the last time) the Football League Cup will have a preliminary round comprised of the two bottom placed teams in the league.
So this means that we have to go to Crawley on Friday 29th July before the season has even started! Kick off is 19.45.
Bollocks.
Can't Man Utd just pull out or something? They've got previous for that sort of thing! Oh no I forgot, it gives their Mini-me's a chance to play proper football for once!
Anyway, obviously MK Dons should be just be kicked out instead for not being a real club but what ya gonna do? This is the situation and we have to deal with it. Let's just hope we can kick Creepy into touch!
Now, let's see if I can get the night off.....

New Direction...Kind of.

Afternoon all.

Just a quick one, this blog was originally started so that I could impose my views on things other than beer but it's pretty much turned into an AFC Wimbledon blog and so I've renamed it and will be reporting on news about AFC Wimbledon, the football league and of course games which I get to this coming season.

Hopefully we're going this way!

See you on the Tempest hopefully!

When Saturday Comes

I read an interesting piece by Wimbledon Legend, Lawrie Sanchez, stressing that win or lose on Saturday, AFC Wimbledon fans should start looking toward the future of our club.

I have to say that to a certain extent I agree with him, I'm as militant as the next man when it comes to MkDons and their franchise football but look at what we have built! Look at what we have achieved! Let's not forget the fact that in 9 years we seen the club start at the bottom of the FA's ladder steadily climb into spitting distance of reclaiming our rightful league status which was so awfully and illegally ripped away from us! That's no mean feat for a team that's owned by the fans now. And look at the example we are setting for other fan-owned clubs such as FC United of Manchester, clubs from abroad are also coming to Kingsmeadow to look at how we do things. It's great to know that teams are looking up to us as a beacon of how things should be done!
Win or lose on Saturday, we need to start leaving the anger behind or we risk people branding us a 'reactionary club'. I'm not saying we should ever forget the fact that the FA branded us 'not in the wider interests of football' and no-one will be happier if we reclaim our league spot and shove it up the FA's jacksie, but surely we need to make plans for the future and enjoy the fact we're doing it on our own?
As nervous as I am this week I'm looking forward to Saturday, as much or a squeaky bum time as it is this week, I'm looking forward to Saturday, as much as I've lost so much sleep this week thinking about the game, I'm still looking forward to Saturday. I don't think it's any coincidence that once again we are playing Luton Town on one of the biggest days in our history. What price 1-0 to AFC Wimbledon with Seb Brown saving a penalty? What price a glancing header from Luke Moore in the 37th Minute?
When Saturday comes I'll see you at Eastlands!

Politics - Pah!

So I have just been and done my 'civic duty' and voted in the argument for constitutional change, or not.
I voted no to AV.
Why? I am a cynic/realist. In a general election you vote for candidates from a certain party that you think match your ideals at the time.
No political candidate has matched mine for quite some time because frankly all politicians are lying scum and until there is such a thing as an 'honest politician'(excuse me whilst I shit myself laughing) there will be no point in electoral reform.
After all, just look at who we have to choose from...

Conservative - Fascist assholes.
Labour sorry 'New' Labour - socialist assholes.
Lib Dems - spineless assholes.
Greens - hippy assholes.
BNP - Thatcher-ite assholes.
UKIP - Cunts.

I'm sure there are more but you get my point.

I have so little faith in ANY party or politician that I don't actually think I will ever vote again, so what's the point in electoral reform if you're just voting in a different strain of asshole.
So I voted, what does that make me?

Just another fucking asshole.

Just don't bore me with this shit in the pub.

Two Sides to Every Fan

So there I was sitting in the bar after the AFC Wimbledon game watching the Arsenal game on the big screen and I glance across the room to see a kid in an AFC Wimbledon shirt cheering for Arsenal! WTF?? Come on kid, you come here every home game, what the hell are you doing cheering the gooner scum? Another thing, if you're from South London and you go to football matches in South London, why are you cheering a team from North London?
It does remind me of my best friend though who supports AFC Wimbledon and also 'supports' a premiership side, what the hell is this phenomena about, surely you can only have one team, can't you?
Personally, as you should know by now, I am a Dons fan, I do look out for Portsmouth scores too as my Grandad took me to my first ever football match at the age of about 6 and it was Portsmouth v Manchester City at Fratton Park but I wouldn't call myself a Pompey fan.
Any explanations folks? I really don't understand this need to support a top flight team if your team isn't in the top flight, is it an acceptance thing? A need to be liked? A need to feel popular?
Help me understand.