AFC Wimbledon are about to enter their third season under the leadership of Johnnie Jackson, and it is fair to say that 2024/25 will be his biggest test yet.

That is because it is likely that he will be measured this season on how much he has grown since starting out in management, and whether he can truly be the man to take the Dons forward in the next few years.

In order to prove his abilities, he will need to assure all critics that he has finally rid himself of his naivety surrounding tactical changes and switch-ups, and show he can be flexible and prepared to deal with the typical troubles that football throws up.

Johnnie Jackson’s managerial failings, and how they are slowly being fixed

Whilst it is a wild statement to suggest that fully qualified football manager has major failings, it does have a degree of truth to it, and that is only because Jackson’s career is still very young.

The former Tottenham Hotspur player started out in management at Charlton Athletic, taking his first steps in two temporary roles at the Addicks, before becoming the permanent boss following the second temporary spell, in which he won nine times in 13 matches.

However, following this success, and an overall successful season, Jackson still had his major shortfalls – sources told Football League World that the general feeling at Charlton was that while he was able to bring together a dressing room that was feeling very disjointed, he had a tactical naivety, and that once he had his plan and approach, he stuck to it. He would rarely change formation or move away from his tactics unless completely forced to.

For a while, this was scarily accurate, as in Jackson’s first season, despite the fact he had somewhat repaired a broken dressing room following relegation from League One, plus a fantastic run of form that saw the Dons comfortably in the playoffs by the Christmas period of 2022, there was a major tail-off in form which saw the club flirt dangerously with the idea of relegation to the National League, and a negative culture began to set in once again.

However, over 2023/24, Jackson seemingly grasped the idea of tactical fluidity, and got the Dons challenging some of League Two’s best last season, and nowhere was this more prominent than against Notts County in the November of 2023.

Following a poor run of form with only one win in seven stretching back to the start of October, Jackson knew he had to change things up if the Dons wanted to stand any chance of firstly, not being embarrassed by one of the more eye-catching teams in the division, but secondly, if they wanted any sort of positive result out of the game.

He certainly did change things up, adopting a slightly different formation than his regular and favoured 4-4-2, by tweaking the midfield to play in a diamond, and by changing the dynamic of the team from a counter-attacking style, to a high pressing style. This shift in tactics got the Dons the perfect outcome, as it was the South West Londoners that ended up embarrassing Notts County, winning 4-2.

While this new diamond-midfield setup would become Jackson’s favoured formation for a while, he would be tested more throughout the rest of the season and pushed to change tactics yet again, this time with long-term injuries being the catalyst. However, through this second period of tactical change-up, he has seemingly found his best formation yet, which some feel could help him bring success to the Dons in 24/25.

Johnnie Jackson has chance to prove doubters wrong in 2024-25

The upcoming season is going to be huge for Johnnie Jackson, as it is ultimately going to be the measure of how much progress he has made and whether he is the right man to take Wimbledon up into League One again, but then potentially further too.

And while pre-season cannot be a perfect measure of how this progression is going, two wins from two and great domination in both games for the Dons is potentially showing that Johnnie Jackson really does have a fantastic chance at proving his doubters wrong.

He has got the Dons playing possession-based, pragmatic and patient football, with the idea of slowly working the ball into wide areas before getting the ball into the box where forwards will be joined by late runners from midfield, such as James Ball and the newly signed Callum Maycock, in the hope that overcrowding the box will lead to chaos, and potentially goals.

However, he has learnt that there needs to be a different approach if needed, and therefore, has coached his squad to execute the killer ball down the wings or through the middle so that the Dons can exploit any space in behind and not dawdle with the ball while playing it out from defence.

He gained his doubters by never having this type of back up plan that is such a tactical switch-up from his primary dynamic, but with the Dons now looking like a dangerous side with the ball, in all areas of the pitch, we may begin to see why he was deserving of the contract extension that was awarded to him and his assistant Terry Skiverton last season.

It will be a test with League Two looking wide open this season, but if Jackson can get it spot on, recruit the perfect players for his new found system, and allow his principles to be swayed from time to time, he could guide Wimbledon out of the fourth tier with ease, playing some very eye-catching football on the way.