Bradford City, Notts County, Port Vale will have new AFC Wimbledon realisation | OneFootball

Following an impressive victory over a fellow promotion hopeful, teams in the promotion race are finding the Dons to be real competition now

The League Two promotion race is a seriously interesting watch this year, with points totals between the top seven places fairly tight.

While Walsall are still runaway leaders, they are slowly being reeled in by the big boys of League Two such as Notts County, Bradford City and Port Vale, who all started this season with hopes of promotion.

However, joining those three teams in the chase for automatic promotion, and arguably the title too, is little old AFC Wimbledon, who many have disregarded time and again this season. However, thanks to some fantastic form and brilliant stats to back that up, there is a new realisation about the promotion-chasing Wombles.

Bradford, Vale and County's hopes for the 2024/25 season

All three of these supposed big boys of the fourth tier all came into this season with the same hope: getting out of this difficult league.

League Two is a tough and physical division that can be impossible to climb out of once in it, and it also occasionally swallows up teams that are in free-fall, like Notts County were back in 2018/19 when they were relegated to the National League.

However, coming into this campaign, the fourth tier was branded as 'open and easy' for the first time in a long while, with no standout teams with power well above the division.

So it was hoped by many around the Bantams that the perennial nearly-men would finally take advantage and move back up to the third tier for the first time since relegation in 18/19, with a talented squad built around the free-scoring Andy Cook.

The West Yorkshire-based side have so often started out recent campaigns strongly and put themselves in a great position to be in and around the promotion hunt, only for the wheels to fall off the cart and end up with them lying just outside the play-offs or even further down the table.

And while Bradford have consistently missed out on third tier football for the past few years, Port Vale have experienced it, but only for a short burst.

The Valiants spent last season back up in League One for the first time since 2016/17, and while that stay was short-lived thanks to horrendous form in the second half of the season, which saw more losses than draws and wins put together, this year, they have heavily invested to make sure promotion was secured again and a repeat of that embarrassment was avoided should they be successful.

Bringing in some of League One and Two's best players, hot non-league talent and a manager that has managed as high as the Premier League in Darren Moore, Vale were seen and spoken about by many as a side that would walk their way back up to League One, and likely felt themselves that they had got a real chance to seize an open opportunity with both hands.

However, thanks to the reignition of Notts County, that has not been the case.

After losing Luke Williams to Swansea, who have since sacked him, a capitulation of playing form saw the Magpies become inconsistent and fall down the table, having spent some of 23/24 in automatic positions.

Trust by the Reedtz brothers in Williams' replacement Stuart Maynard, though, meant that coming into this campaign, thanks to shrewd investment in transfers, County fired themselves right back into the race for promotion, where they felt they deserved to be following such consistently strong showings in the National League.

AFC Wimbledon have worked quietly to place themselves as strong contenders

Despite all these hopes though, and all the predictions made by social media experts about the three aforementioned League Two clubs, the Dons have slowly wormed their way into the fight between these three clubs to position themselves not only as contenders for the automatics, but also as the strongest competition that Walsall have got for the title that many felt the Saddlers already had their hands on.

Johnnie Jackson has got his boys in yellow and blue playing well, combining great pressing and attacking threats in Matty Stevens and Omar Bugiel with fantastic wing-play from James Tilley and Josh Neufville and defensive solidity all through the midfield, defence and in between the sticks.

And while individual performances certainly help with the Dons' placement near the top of the tree, stats help back up the fact that, following the most recent home victory against Salford City, the South West London side are a team that others can underestimate, but do so at their own peril.

Both Vale and County are still yet to face Wimbledon at home, and despite securing the victories when the Dons traveled to them, the recent, dominant win that the Dons got over Bradford should prove to both that their fixtures at Plough Lane will be tough and will be promotion six-pointers, despite the differing confidence and hopes that all these sides had at the start of the season.

But it should come as no surprise that the Dons are now, until the end of the season, going to be stern and genuine competition, as it was only three years ago that their six-year stay, the longest of all of these sides, in League One was ended.

So, while the story of this fascinating season down in the fourth tier is far from finished, perhaps the chapter about little old Wimbledon, underestimated and underrated by many, should be focused on just a little bit more from now on.