Stockdale’s first impressions of MK Dons and working with head coach Jackson

A win in any form is important for MK Dons this season, and Saturday’s triumph over Forest Green Rovers left Robbie Stockdale with plenty to be pleased with.

The new assistant head coach was stood over Mark Jackson’s shoulder for the first time in a Dons top at the weekend, and though the game between - at the time - two of the division’s relegation zone residents won’t go down as a classic, the points at the end of it certainly helped as the team from MK1 climbed out of the bottom four.

With two tough games coming up this week at Stadium MK against Shrewsbury Town and Exeter City - both in the top half of League One - Stockdale said there were more elements of the Forest Green win that he liked seeing than there were to dislike, and that scrappy wins are just as important as any other.

“It showed a side of the team that was really pleasing,” he said. “We'd all love to play beautiful football on a warm- sunny day at the start of the season and win 3-0 but you don't always see that.

“What we saw on Saturday wasa gritty performance. The pitch was difficult, it was hard, but there were moments of quality and bits we liked. But the most pleasing thing was showing real character to come back into the game after going behind.

“There are different ways of winning games.”

Matching styles

Stockdale and Jackson had not crossed paths prior to the former’s appointment at Dons, but the former Hull coach believes their ideas of what a good football team looks like are very much in line.

The former Rochdale boss, who has also spent time coaching at Sunderland, Hull and West Brom admitted Dons are a long way from the finished article, or indeed the vision Jackson has for what that team should be doing but feels their views are alligned on how to get the players into a good place for that to begin to happen.

He said: “When the first contact was made, they did their due diligence on me and my stats at Rochdale were very high in lots of aspects. In terms of how we want to play, that fits but it's a process - that's a common word in football now!

“Mark has a very clear vision of what he wants his team to look like but we're not anywhere near that at the moment. Players are still getting used to it, but we'll get there.

“Hopefully in the not-too-distant future, we'll see something which resembles a really strong football team.”