Marked for Freddie Simmonds
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad19 Apr 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AFC Wimbledon this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The terraces19 Apr 2027
He is 22 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Squad19 Apr 2027
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at AFC Wimbledon can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Player ratings19 Apr 2027
7.33, and no serious argument from anybody who was there. AFC Wimbledon had eleven men on the pitch and one of them decided how it went.
The dugout19 Apr 2027
The team sheet said everything about Freddie Simmonds
Warm-up bib, ninety minutes of watching, and a handshake at the end that fooled nobody. Big matches tell you who a manager trusts; this one told Freddie Simmonds.
The dugout19 Apr 2027
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
Squad19 Apr 2027
One weekend, judged against everybody else's. Dujuan Richards has come out on top of it, and for most footballers a weekly award is the only silverware a career ever produces.
Match17 Apr 2027
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Burton Albion defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
Looking ahead19 Apr 2027
Wigan Athletic next, and one man in the AFC Wimbledon dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match9 Jan 2027
8 matches without a win for AFC Wimbledon
The run now stands at 8, and the questions being asked around AFC Wimbledon are no longer polite ones.
Squad11 Jan 2027
There were 8 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Transfer targets11 Jan 2027
Everything agreed with Preston, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Player ratings11 Jan 2027
Marked 7.75 at 21, in a side that makes no allowances for age. He did not need any, and he looked the least nervous man on the pitch.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Freddie Simmonds is 18, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Match9 Jan 2027
1‑3 to Cardiff City, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Transfer targets11 Jan 2027
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Hull City have kept their man, and AFC Wimbledon go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Andy Yiadom in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AFC Wimbledon this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout11 Jan 2027
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Matthew Johnson after 1‑3, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad16 Nov 2026
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 10 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Player ratings16 Nov 2026
At 34 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 7.81, and nobody on the pitch better.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Joseph Phillips and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Match14 Nov 2026
It had gone 6 games. The players did not celebrate like men who had won a match; they celebrated like men who had been let out of something.
Player ratings16 Nov 2026
21 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
Match14 Nov 2026
It finished 1‑0, and it was Harry Cornick’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to AFC Wimbledon.
Player ratings16 Nov 2026
Harry Cornick was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.01. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Matthew Johnson kept it short after the 1‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad12 Oct 2026
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 17 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Match10 Oct 2026
2 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Dujuan Richards will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at AFC Wimbledon escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
The dugout12 Oct 2026
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Freddie Simmonds is 18, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Match10 Oct 2026
5 matches, two or more conceded in every one of them. Sides that create as much as this can live with it for a while. Nobody lives with it forever.
Squad12 Oct 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Marcus Browne commits to AFC Wimbledon for another 4 years.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Dujuan Richards and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Player ratings12 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 15. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market5 Oct 2026
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at AFC Wimbledon, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad5 Oct 2026
3 goals in one game. The first was taken well, the second was taken greedily, and by the third the crowd were simply waiting for him to get the ball.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
No sign of nerves from Freddie Simmonds at 18 — 7.62
The hardest thing about being 18 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Freddie Simmonds did not need any: 7.62, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Squad5 Oct 2026
At 21 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Marked 9.45 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Andy Yiadom and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Match3 Oct 2026
4 matches, two or more conceded in every one of them. Sides that create as much as this can live with it for a while. Nobody lives with it forever.
Squad5 Oct 2026
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market3 Aug 2026
Hibernians come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and AFC Wimbledon did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Harry Cornick commits to AFC Wimbledon for another 3 years.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Freddie Simmonds and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words at AFC Wimbledon training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Andy Yiadom is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Transfer targets3 Aug 2026
A loan enquiry to Wrexham: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
Transfer targets3 Aug 2026
A loan enquiry to Arsenal: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
Squad3 Aug 2026
5 new faces, and AFC Wimbledon are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Market3 Aug 2026
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
The dugout3 Aug 2026
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.