Snow, ice, freezing cold temperatures, faceless streets and endless roundabouts.  City's first - and hopefully last - visit to Milton Keynes sees us secure a slightly jammy point with a late equaliser.

I should confess that I have an occasional tendency to mix up people with similar names. Tom Wolfe and Tom Waits, for example. “Ah yes”, I have been known to remark thoughtfully, on being asked my views on the gravel-voiced chanteur de nos jours, “Bonfire of the Vanities, indeed a richly dark exploration of the human condition”. Theresa Bazar? No one exceeds me in admiration for her work among the poor and sick of Calcutta. And it may reveal some altogether unsettling glimpses of my obsessional dislike of nitpicking “footie” burbler John Motson that when my young nephew proudly showed off his collection of pictures of legendary hellraisers Motley Crue I was moved to observe “why, they haven’t even got their sheepskin coats on”.

But not even I would be moved to confuse Milton Keynes with a proper football club.

Through the 1980s Wimbledon offered as gloriously barmy a tale as football in this country has ever concocted, piling up absurd successes on the strength of unmatched team spirit, honest hard work and vastly under-rated tactical nous. That club was destroyed, its identity stolen shamefully by Milton Keynes, its soul now to be found in the Isthmian League. You cannot invent a football club. “Milton Keynes Dons” are a lie.

Any parent that purchases a scarf for its offspring and takes it along to watch these interlopers is a leech sucking the decency out of our game. I cannot abide the witless nerds who journey from Cornwall, from East Yorkshire and, yes, from Milton Keynes to watch their football at Old Trafford, as if they have any right to claim a share in the inheritance, but at least Manchester United were once a Proper Football Club, and even now they have some proper fans too. The shameful Americanised bunch we confronted last night are not and never will be a Proper Football Club. Franchise scum. Sink, don’t swim and let us sneer at your lifeless body, the sooner the better.

You Hull City fans who bought food and drink on hockey premises last night, you’re not much better either.

I really wanted to win this game last night, I so much wanted to. Still, let me accentuate the positive. We gnawed our way through gritty Franchise defending to claim an equaliser with only four minutes left on the clock, so this felt more like a point gained than two lost. We deserved our draw, too. But Milton Keynes deserve nothing but contempt and they fiddled their way to more than that last night, and it pains me.

We won on Saturday but now it’s Tuesday, and it’s a re-shuffle. Is this sensible? On a tough away-from-home assignment I had expected the Hess to start, but I was surprised to see both Elliott and Barmby consigned to the subs’ bench.

Myhill
Stockdale Cort Delaney Edge
Green Hessenthaler Ashbee Ellison
Facey Alsop

We’re almost ahead inside the first minute. Facey causes anxiety in the heart of the home defence and though the ball doesn’t drop kindly for him to crack in a shot, it finds its way to Alssop who, only eight yards out and with no immediate opponent, butchers a fine opportunity by slicing a right-foot shot woefully wide. This occurs directly in front of a decent travelling support of 750 or so, housed on a roofless wooden stand which offers seats, though no one uses them. It’s cold, and snowflakes dot the air, but predictions that a polar bear would have been after slipping on a pair of sealskin mitts, after devouring the donor, are wide of the mark. It’s a degree below zero, but nothing more severe – and, crucially, no wind chill. The pitch itself has a thin covering of snow, with the lines swept clear by a peculiar type of reverse-suction hoover. Modernity! I remember sturdy brushes. Not in Milton Keynes, if you please.

We’re the better side, as Milton Keynes, attempting to float around in all white like 1950s Real Madrid, look more like skimmed milk. Sport is had with doughty ex-Tiger netman Matt Baker, whose uncertain kicking attracts derision. But he improves. And we’re not breaking through.

A low shot from Ashbee is safely gathered by Baker. A deft Alsopp turn offers a shooting opportunity, but a decent effort flies a foot or so the wrong side of Baker’s far post. We’re keeping it sensibly simple. Hess and Ash wouldn’t pretend to be able to offer anything other, while Green down the right is passing and giving, no frills. Ellison is pushed far out wide on the left and is putting in a worthwhile shift. He makes himself available and when he gets the ball he sticks in a series of low crosses just behind defenders who, on a frozen surface, are not at all comfortable when forced to turn. I wouldn’t go so far as to say Ellison had a peach of a game last night, but I wouldn’t be blowing him any raspberries on this performance.

The first half is past its midway point and we’ve been much the better side but it’s still 0-0 and now the vigour vanishes from the play. Having kept the ball on the floor, we now seem to become more aerial, more aimless. It’s a downright dull quarter-of-an-hour’s football until, on 39, Ashbee shakes the game from its slumber by surrendering possession carelessly out by the touchline. Milton – or is it Keynes? – surges forward with the gift, but pots his efforts well wide of Myhill’s far post. A minute later it’s our turn to show off some crass finishing as a defender loses his footing inside the box, presenting Facey, ten yards out, with plenty of time to compose himself and send the ball whistling past the exposed ‘keeper. Facey instead takes a wild smear, slicing the ball horribly to his right where it eventually dribbles out apologetically for an MK throw.

Half-time. 0-0. We’re the superior force. Morally, I mean, as well in football terms.

But just four minutes into the second half we fall behind. A ball is lofted cleverly from their left to the far post where one of theirs shapes to shoot but hits the ball poorly and it trundles back across the face of our goal. Lewington, a ginger-haired menace whose work-rate is prodigious all game long, pounces to shove a close-range shot past Myhill, who can only get a despairing glove on the ball …. But he’s surely offside? The linesman’s not giving it. It’s a goal. Instinctive things, tight offsides. I thought the Peterborough equaliser last month was onside, though the majority of City fans disagreed. Last night I stood where I would normally prefer not to - with the majority. Offside. In my view. Which counts for nothing. It is 1-0.

If there’s one suspicion I didn’t want confirming it was my expectation that if the home side did score, our ears would be assailed by loud tuneless “crowd-pumping” muzak. It duly arrived. Pre-pubescent cheerleaders, a witlessly over-excited announcer, a scoreboard flashing exhortation to sing. I know where the inspiration for this “matchday experience” comes from, and it’s several thousand miles west of Northamptonshire. Please please let them fail. Reminders that we weren’t in America were on offer in the pub nearest the ground, where service was dutifully sullen and slow, while inside the hockey stadium itself we were confronted by one major plus – a towering and completely empty set of makeshift and frankly alarmingly unstable seats up one side that put me in mind of an Eastern European athletics stadium circa 1975 – and one huge minus, perhaps the most grotesque of them all. For at the far end, where the home “supporters” congregate, a spankin’ brand new sign informs us that the plastic stand which it adorns is “The Cowshed”.

No it is not. NO IT IS NOT. You slavering, banal, merchandising, franchising, contemptuous, disrespectful shower of robbers. This is my game, get your evil hands off it.

Within seconds of the re-start a sharp shot by Alsop forces a fine diving stop to his left from Baker, who pushes the ball round his post. So we won a corner, though it seems to me that the financial stability of FC Milton Keynes would have been greatly enhanced had the corner instead been awarded to them, so I was surprised to see no faceless bureaucrats decide to reverse referee Russell’s decision.

On 59, the expected change arrives. Since the break Green, Facey and Ellison have all disappeared from the game, and it is no surprise that one of them – Green – makes his exit, though it is a little more unexpected that A’lsop should join him. On comes France and, to play up front, Elliott.

It doesn’t help any. The referee is awarding some baffling decisions against us, consistently conned by theatrics from players, especially McLeod, who have made their Faustian Franchise pact, but generally we’re not flowing. It’s hard to flow on a tricky pitch and against opponents who are holding a doggedly defensive shape. The game would be nailed on for 0-0. If it weren’t already 1-0.

On 68, we won a corner, though it seems to me that the financial stability of FC Milton Keynes would have been greatly enhanced had the corner instead been awarded to them, so I was surprised to see no faceless bureaucrats decide to reverse referee Russell’s decision. The kick flies across the face of the goal and out via the far post. Criminally no one gets a touch.

A minute later, we won another corner, though it seems to me that by now if, as the fable tells, a cowboy could dismount from a hard-ridden horse thinking it dead whereupon an Apache could coax another 100 miles out of the beast, then a large percentage of tig-chatters who’ve got this far might be thinking that when it comes to vindictive grudge-bearing one S. Weatherill could show that Apache a clean pair of heels. I wear it as a badge of honour. Football can be – though rarely is - a noble triumph of hope over expectation, and, for their decade-long walk with rarity, Wimbledon were to be cherished. How very sweet it would be to see AFC Wimbledon sweep upwards past their usurpers, though do allow the pair to spend one season in each other’s company.

With fifteen minutes remaining Barmby replaces Ellison, allowing Elliott to drop back to his normal left-sided position, and we set off into the final stretch in search of salvation. France almost provides it with a shot that is a shade tamely hit – Baker beats it away to his left. Another corner, Barmby nudges it goalwards at the near post, but the ball serenely escapes beyond the far post. Is it going to happen for us?

Yes it is.

It’s on 86, it’s up the far end, and I don’t know what happened.

It’s a fine delivery from the left by (I think) Edge, and all of a sudden the sturdy refusal to yield on offer from the home side throughout the second period of the game is shredded. It looks like careless defending rather than inventive attacking, but the ball drops kindly to Facey, who has time to ram a low shot into the net from eight or so yards out.

Thank you and goodnight. Milton Keynes. Won’t be coming back here again.

HULL CITY (4-4-2): Myhill; Stockdale, Cort, Delaney, Edge; Green, Ashbee, Hessenthaler, Ellison; Facey, Allsopp.  Subs: France (for Green, 60), Elliott (for Allsopp, 60), Barmby (for Ellison, 76), Duke, Lewis.

Goals: Facey 86

Booked: None

Sent Off: None

MILTON KEYNES DONS: Baker, Oyedele, Chorley, Pensee-Bilong, Crooks, Small, Harding, Mitchell, Lewington, McLeod, Platt.  Subs: Edds (for Mitchell, 70), Kamara, Smart, Puncheon, Palmer.

Goals: Lewington 50

Booked: Pensee-Bilong

Sent Off: None

REFEREE: M Russell

ATTENDANCE: 4,407