Terry Skiverton: Wimbledon 'still in a good place' after defeat

Wimbledon were beaten by Port Vale today (April 26) in the last scheduled game at the Cherry Red Records Stadium for the season - elongating a poor run of form.

Vale, who secured their automatic promotion to League One, scored twice in quick succession although the second goal in particular was draped in controversy as referee Declan Bourne failed to stop the game for a head injury to Wimbledon defender Riley Harbottle.

In the aftermath of the second goal, manager Johnnie Jackson was shown a red card for his protests against the referee's decision.

"Harbottle gets a head injury and the referee plays on for 20 seconds and Vale go on to score," said Jackson's right hand man - Terry Skiverton.

“Harbottle was then down for five and a half minutes and then had to go off for the same injury.

Terry Skiverton was disappointed with the referee not stopping play for Harbottle's head injury (Image: Kirk Pritchard) “Seven minutes later, one of their players goes down with a head injury whilst we’re on the attack and guess what the referee does? He blows up for a head injury – we are really disappointed with that."

Despite feeling hard done by, Skiverton admitted that Port Vale deserved to be promoted today.

He said: “They’re a really good side with experienced players and they got promoted today through being professional, slowing the game down, not allowing us to gain momentum and they’ve got the likes of Ronan Curtis to come on and see the game out

“It’s disappointing from our point of view but it’s a good lesson and it’s good to see a team get promoted against you because now we know what we have to do.

“That support base turned up in numbers today and got behind us but we need to give them more in attacking threat – we didn’t give them enough today and we’re aware of that."

“The fans are still 100 per cent behind us – we could feel that."

Marcus Browne was brought on in the second half after being sidelined with an injury for the past few weeks (Image: Kirk Pritchard) Marcus Browne and Myles Hippolyte both featured from the bench in the loss - their first appearances in weeks due to injury.

“We’re still in a good place – we’ve got the skipper (Jake Reeves) back, we’ve got Browne back, we’ve got Hippolyte back and we’re going into this last game of the season with a fully fit squad.

“This club’s not been in this situation for a good few years and we need to make sure that we stick together and not let the doom and gloom get to us.

“If someone said to us that we’re going to go into this last game of the season to get play-offs and potentially get promoted we’d have bitten their hand off.”

Skiverton claimed that the red card shown to Jackson "doesn't change anything" ahead of the Dons' trip to Grimsby next Saturday (May 3).

"The gaffer will still be there watching, he’ll have a voice down to the bench and the players will continue to give it everything they can," he said.

“The big thing we’ve got to take away from today is putting more emphasis on the opposing goal – we need to create more chances and be a bit braver in our attacks."

A win at Grimsby next weekend would secure a play-off place for the Dons.