The 2012-13 season was the club’s second in League Two and it wasn’t going well. The Dons were lingering near the relegation zone and were forced to sack their longtime manager. Things were looking up when Neal Ardley was brought in, but everyone knew it would be a long climb. Wimbledon got a boost in the FA Cup when they beat York City 4-3 in a First Round replay. Then the Second Round draw brought what Wimbledon fans had been dreading for the past decade— a match against Milton Keynes.
That game, weeks away, was what shook away some of my cobwebs. All of a sudden my entire life hinged on this soccer game between two teams I hadn’t even heard about a month prior. I didn’t know if I met the “qualifications” to be a fan of this obscure fourth division English football team, but I knew I needed them to win. I needed to believe that you could lose everything and eventually be okay afterward.