AFC Wimbledon let Notts County and Bradford City off the hook despite Crewe demolition | OneFootball

The Dons were dominant during their midweek win, but let promotion rivals off the hook by not punishing Crewe more

Johnnie Jackson's AFC Wimbledon cruised to a comfortable 3-0 win over Crewe Alexandra during the week.

But despite a fair amount of positives coming from the game, there is still the overriding feeling that the Dons could have done more with their man advantage over the Staffordshire side.

The Dons do have a healthy goal difference, but more pressure could have been added to sides around them by adding more strikes to the goal tally the other night.

Notts County, Bradford City fortunate to not have more pressure piled on by AFC Wimbledon

The pressure during the promotion race at this stage of the season is already quite high, but the wick could have been turned up higher by the Dons during their 3-0 midweek home win.

Wimbledon held a man advantage for over half of the game, and even before their northern opposition were reduced to ten men, they looked competitive and ready to fight for a well-earned win.

But holding that advantage for that amount of time meant that not only could they press home their numerical difference just before half-time, but they could also spend the entirety of the second half making the most of it too, if manager Johnnie Jackson played his cards right during the interval.

However, while the former Charlton boss did not do anything to disrupt the Dons' approach to the game, the side would score their last goal of the match minutes before the hour mark, and then spent the remainder of the 90 minutes passing the ball about, playing down the clock minute by minute.

It means that their 42 goals scored so far this season were not added to.

The race for the autos, and play-offs, is tight, with many top sides that have just missed out on promotion in the past few years fighting it out with some of League Two's best in-form teams for the top seven spots in the division.

And with each respective teams' points totals quite close together at this stage, goal difference is starting to become that evermore crucial factor.

The teams closest to Wimbledon not only on points, but also in terms of goal difference, are Notts County and Bradford City, with the trio all boasting great attacks and solid defences, helping keep all three in contention for promotion to the third tier.

Looking further into how the goal difference splits up, specifically goals scored, the Dons find themselves only behind Notts, as well as table-toppers Walsall and Doncaster Rovers in the top seven for that category.

However, they have also scored less than the likes of Chesterfield, who sit in 10th, and Swindon, who are all the way down in 16th, which makes the fact they couldn't put Crewe more to the sword the other night even more frustrating.

Therefore, despite the Dons complementing their slightly low scoring efforts with a very tight defence, the best in the league in fact, Bradford, as well as Notts, may just feel a little eased that the Dons are not breathing down their neck anymore than they already are with a goal difference pushing into the mid-20s.

Despite not adding goals, Crewe demolition still had positives for Wimbledon

It may seem a little too critical to pick out negatives from what was otherwise a pretty brilliant evening, but given how turbulent second halves of seasons have been in the recent past for Wimbledon, the lingering feeling of impending doom still creeps into the mind of many Dons fans.

However, Tuesday night may have just confirmed to many that the rest of this season looks to be pretty rosy for the boys in yellow and blue, with multiple positives being evident upon the full-time whistle, despite not being able to put a little more pressure on both the Bantams and the Magpies.

Firstly, Matty Stevens found the net again after a mini-drought of four games, scoring a brace with a penalty and a brilliant first-time finish, very much in the nature of his poacher play-style. No doubt this will have given him a big boost to know that he has found his scoring touch again, but with the former Forest Green Rovers man now equal with Nathan Lowe, who no longer plays in League Two, for goals this season, means he looks well in the race for the golden boot, something he will be keen to earn once again.

Secondly, the Dons' defence, which is the meanest in the division, kept yet another clean sheet and looked impregnable, standing solid to any sniff of a Crewe attack, both before and after the red card in the 40th minute. Which meant that Wimbledon ended the midweek fixtures with the second-best goal difference of +22, only behind leaders Walsall.

And lastly, it seems that Dons fans have an answer to how Johnnie Jackson will continue to give Aron Sasu, who is seen as the next big attacking prospect to graduate from Wimbledon's youth ranks, gametime alongside new signing Osman Foyo.

While yes, Sasu was given considerably longer on the field than Foyo the other night, the Norwegian youth international looked a worthwhile replacement for Josh Neufville at right wing-back, with his electric pace beating his opposition marker more than four times in the space of less than half an hour, and his defensive work rate looking promising too, positioning himself well to win headers and making sure to contribute a commendable work rate.

Meanwhile, Foyo looked to be a great option off the left side of the attack to help keep the Dons active in games all the way through to the end, with his no-fear running and pressing of the opposition almost paying off when he broke free from the backline and struck an early, but fierce, shot at Crewe's Filip Marschall.

When all is said and done at the end of the day, there is little fault to be found in how much the Dons impressed, not only in this home fixture against the Alex, but also away.

This could be a pair of fixtures that tip the club one way, or the other, when autos or play-offs are decided upon at the end of the season.

When that crunch time comes, the Dons will only hope that it's not settled on goal difference after a week when they've taken their foot off the gas when the chance was there to accelerate.