“I think the last 10 games, we’ve won five, that’s a 50% win rate, so they’re fit to wear the jersey – please don’t say that, don’t sing that.

“The players are working extremely hard and we will get there. We just need to all be connected and recognize that we can only get to where we want to get if we are all together.”

Lindsey led Crawley to promotion from League Two last season, beating the Dons 8-1 on aggregate before winning the play-offs.

But he chose to move down a division to join Stadium: MK and earlier this month described the Dons as “the biggest club in the division”.

The disappointment of the Wimbledon defeat was compounded by Connor Lemonheigh-Evans’ second-half sending off – and Lindsey was unhappy with the defense for both goals.

He said: “They are very good at what they do, they were good at the dark arts of the game. They took their time after going 2-0 up and the referee sort of allowed that to happen .

“We are in Ligue 2, we are going to (have to) defend against direct balls in every match and if we cannot do better, we will not get where we need to get.

“It’s my fault, I need to work more with them.”

Lindsey will be hoping for an immediate response from his players when they return to league action at home to his former club Swindon Town on Saturday.

He added: “The boys have done fantastic things since I’ve been here and we have to stick with them.”