Hodges delighted as Wimbledon snatch late point against Lincoln

Posted Sunday, November 03, 2019 by PA

Glyn Hodges admitted a 1-1 draw felt like a win after Kwesi Appiah’s last-gasp strike salvaged a point against Lincoln.

Jack Payne put the visitors ahead by ending a counter-attack with a neat finish at the near post before the break.

But Appiah headed home Luke O’Neill’s pinpoint cross deep in added time to see the spoils shared in Hodges’ first game as full-time Dons manager.

“We’re pleased to get a point at the end,” he said.

“We’re out of the relegation zone now and have shown some really good form recently.

“Our results have improved over the last month and hopefully that’s a turning point for us. We’ve got to keep this run going and pick up as many points as we can.

“It’s a great finish from Kwesi. To show that kind of composure late on like that is special. He’s a fantastic player and hopefully he can kick on for us now and get a few more goals to his name

“It’s a great ball in late on from Luke [O’Neill] and a good finish.

“At times we had to defend and they had a lot of chances but that’s football.

“You can’t always have things your own way and to get a point that late on always feels like a win.”

Dons goalkeeper Nathan Trott made two good early saves to keep out Michael O’Connor and Tyler Walker, with Lincoln ruing the missed chances.

Joe Pigott and Anthony Wordsworth boasted the best opportunities for the hosts but it was a feeling of two points lost for Michael Appleton’s City.

He said: “It’s a difficult one to take. But you’ve got to be mindful of what happened before that. It’s easy not to remember what happened for the other 93 minutes.

“The reality is, and the reason why we’ve only got a point today, we weren’t clinical enough.

“Luckily we go in a goal ahead at the break and we had our chances in the second half to kill the game off.

“I’m not going to forget that, I’ll be reminding the players of that. We’ve got to find a way to be more ruthless.

“I can only remember Josh needing to make a decent save from a corner, which you expect because they have a big team.

“They probably had a 10-minute spell, but apart from that we dealt with them quite comfortably. That’s probably why it feels like a sucker punch and a body blow really.”