Shrewsbury v AFC Wimbledon preview

Shrewsbury must secure three points against the side that prop up the League One table if they are going to win a third straight league game for the first time this season, writes Lewis Cox.

Confidence in the Town fanbase has received a shot in the arm after back-to-back wins against Peterborough and Doncaster, with 17th-placed Town now four games unbeaten.

The latest win, on Tuesday, put Sam Ricketts’ side five points clear of the drop zone just a few weeks after they sat 23rd.

A 2-1 win at AFC Wimbledon’s Kingsmeadow in November – which featured a Waterfall brace, including a last-minute winner – prolonged John Askey’s tenure before he was sacked nine days later.

“It’s nice to score and to get two that day, last-minute winners are always nice but we need to carry on this run now and start looking up rather than down,” said defensive regular Waterfall.

“We spoke about it a hell of a lot, the away record, hopefully it’s another thing we can improve on going forward.

“You can never ever take anything for granted. We can’t think that because we’ve beat two good teams that we’ve finally cracked it, it’s not like that in this league.

“Wimbledon might be bottom but it’ll be a tough, tough game, probably tougher than Doncaster.”

“We’ve got to keep taking it one game at a time and be 110 per cent in every game.”

Wally Downes’ men have shown signs of a revival in recent weeks.

They were able to build on an excellent FA Cup run, including a victory over West Ham before going out to Millwall, with some imperative league victories. The Dons won at drop zone rivals Walsall before coming out on top in a crunch topsy-turvy 4-3 victory at Rochdale.

But the 2-1 home defeat to Charlton last time out stunted Wimbledon’s progress as sides above them, such as Shrewsbury, managed to win.

A victory tomorrow would be Town’s first league double of the season.

“They’ve picked up the last couple of weeks and had a good Cup run, they’ve probably drawn confidence from that,” added Waterfall.

“Nobody is expecting an easy game, even though they’re bottom of the league – I don’t read too much into that.

“They’ll be coming here fighting for their lives and the three points, just like we were on Tuesday night. They’ll be doing exactly what we were in the second half on Tuesday.

“If we can play the football we did in the first half and defend as well as we did second half, then we’ll be fine.”

The defender knows the run of three games against Wimbledon, Rochdale and Plymouth are crucial in easing Town’s relegation fears.

He added: “We’ve come out of the two games with six points which is absolutely fantastic.

“I said to myself if we could come out with a good little points total then we’ve got three games against teams around us.

“We need to be looking at doing well against them, racking the points up in these three games.

“That’s not to put pressure on anyone else, any of the lads, but if we want to fire ourselves up the table we need to go and get these points.”

The Opposition - AFC Wimbledon

AFC Wimbledon's recent mini-revival will have certainly focused Shrewsbury Town’s attention ahead of tomorrow’s fixture.

At one point the Dons looked cut adrift at the foot of League One with up to 10-or-so clubs above them battling to stay out of the other three relegation places.

But, on the back of their impressive run to the FA Cup fifth round, where they exited against Championship Millwall, Wally Downes’ men fought their way to some crucial league wins to re-ignite their season.

A victory against the odds at struggling Walsall on a Tuesday night was huge and the Kingsmeadow outfit were able to back that up with a thrilling 4-3 win at drop zone rivals Rochdale.

They put Wimbledon in touch with the clubs directly above them, but the resurrection was halted slightly by the home defeat to Charlton last time out. While the Dons were losing 2-1 against the Addicks, fellow relegation battlers were picking up three points.

Downes’ men need as many as seven victories from their remaining 12 games to reach the 50 point mark.

That will be a tough ask given they have won just eight of their 34 matches so far.

The Dons, who fell to a seventh straight league loss when John Askey’s Salop won there at the start of November, have undoubtedly improved since former hero Downes took over at the beginning of December. But they are still suffering from inconsistency, despite Shrews boss Sam Ricketts believing Dons are playing better than a team rock-bottom.

Downes has brought some zest into his team’s play and they may seem better equipped to play away, where they have lost just once in five games (at Sunderland).

But they have only scored 13 goals on their travels, the joint-lowest – with Blackpool – in the division.

In frontman Joe Pigott and partner Michael Folivi they have a burgeoning partnership.

The latter, on loan from Watford, scored his first senior league goal last weekend.

But powerful and experienced frontman James Hanson remains a fitness doubt, while commanding skipper Deji Oshilaja (foot), a linchpin of the defence, is out.

Forward Kwesi Appiah returned to training this week and may be fit enough for the bench.