Amazing

[Laurence]

In 1993 I retired from the Fire Brigade in Lancashire and was offered a job in the deep south in Kent

A work mate  of mine was a Wimbledon fan,  he took me to matches .and I soon got hooked. For many seasons a I watched Wimbledon play Premier league football on Crystal Palace's ground Selhurst park.

14 years ago the club was stolen off the fans and franchised to Milton Keynes.  The Fans formed a new club themselves, ( sitting  on hay bales on an amateur ground )  they joined the 9th level of English football, determined to fight back their rightful place now they are in the 3rd  tier of English football, Fantastic spirit of Neil Hardley who I watched play against all the top sides .

Now AFC Wimbledon are in the the same league as MK Dons,  What a game that will be next season when the teams meet on level terms.

My memories of that period of my life returned today. Unbelievable feeling I can tell you.

Edited May 30, 2016 by Laurence
spelling mistake

[Robert]

Enjoy next season!!

[Caley Mad In Berks]

My next door neighbour is a true Wimbledon fan as well. He too has watched them climb back up the leagues from obscurity to where they have now reached.  He even drove up to Accrington the other day for their play off semi final, second leg, arriving back down here at 3.30am, when he and his wife were flying off on holiday only 4 hours later!.  You can imagine how pleased she was about that!.

I get a lot of enjoyment out of seeing his obvious happiness.  It sort of reminds me of our journey up through the leagues. I'm sure Wimbledon's first match against MK Dons next season will be be quite emotionally charged.  Anyway I know who I'll be rooting for.

[Eagle4Caley]

I saw Wimbledon's very first league game at Plugh Lane against Halifax, and I also saw them play Leeds Utd in an FA Cup replay at Selhurst Park (Palace's ground)... Later on we then endured the ground-sharing arrangement with Wimbledon, when they had to move out of their ground, and can recall them beating Palace 5-0 at Selhurst Park, when they were technically away, a low moment indeed. Palace largely had the upper hand overall, but we have never matched the 'Dons' epic achievement of winning the FA Cup, despite two attempts. All credit to the bunch of supporters who faced down the opposition of other interest and indeed the Football League to re-surrect their club. For some obscure reason they don't like Palace, which seems a bit unreasonable given that the ground-sharing arrangement kept them in business. During that period the two respective chairtman hatched a plan to merge the two clubs (sounds familar?) and met with hostility from both sets of supporters (sounds familar?), although it was probably a none starter. I shall watch their progress this year with interest.