Terry: Wimbledon can still reach the play-offs

Terry Brown tonight insisted Wimbledon can still make the Blue Square Premier play-offs.

The manager remains in a positive frame of mind despite watching his team chuck away a first minute lead to lose at the Broadfield Stadium.

Danny Kedwell’s early strike – a cool lob after getting the better of debutant defender Matt Langston – looked to get the Dons’ top five charge back on track after a ropey few weeks.

But poorly defended goals by Danny Forrest and Charlie Ademeno gave the Red Devils another home win.

Brown says he has the belief that his team will still finish in the top five but described Saturday’s visit of Eastbourne as a “simply must win” game.

He said: “We’re not out of it yet, not by a long way. You can’t count us out.

“Look at the results that have come in tonight. Hayes won at Oxford and York lost at home to Salisbury. We’ll keep getting these kind of scores as we’re at that time of the year.

“We can still make the play-offs and I wouldn’t write us off just yet. We’ve looked out of it before and I think we’ll still have a say.

“For the average spectator it was a fantastic game. Perhaps not for our fans here tonight but both sides really gave it everything.

“I thought Crawley deserved to go in front. They had the best of the first hour but we came on strong. Crawley worked very hard and overall I have no complaints about the result.

“They were good value for it. It’s such a tough place to come and Crawley were well motivated. Our central defenders struggled to get hold of their attackers.”

On this weekend’s visit of Eastbourne, the manager is convinced Wimbledon can and will bounce back.

He added: “Our home record in the last six games is five wins and a draw I think. I know we’ll bounce back, we have to and there are no excuses for not winning on Saturday.

“It’s a very big game for us now but there are still a lot of points left for us to fight for.”

Crawley assistant manager Paul Rayner said: “Wimbledon are a big club. We’ve beaten them and last week we beat Luton – we deserved the three points both times.”