In his post-match interview, Terry Brown bemoaned the Dons’ slow start to this FA Cup Fourth Qualifying Round tie at Broadfield Stadium, saying that it took his side “yonks” to get going. It’s doubtful that anyone has ever calculated the exact length of time that constitutes “yonks”, but my guess, for what it’s worth, would be 52 minutes.

It was Kennedy Adjei’s 52nd-minute arrival that changed the entire complexion of a game that AFC Wimbledon were in serious danger of losing, so as well as earning a place in tomorrow’s draw for the First Round Proper, the Dons might have also made a minor mathematical discovery.

By the time the combative midfielder made his entrance, the scores were level at 1-1, but for the first 35 minutes the visitors looked lethargic, showed poor positional sense and were hesitant in defence. Crawley, on the other hand, looked capable of scoring with every attack - and most of those attacks were set up by AFC Wimbledon’s team-wide inability to retain possession.

Crawley took a deserved lead on 13 minutes, and the goal owed as much to the Dons’ defending as it did to the home side’s creativity. Alan Inns blocked Jefferson Louis’s close-range effort with a well-timed tackle, but the ball bounced loose to Thomas Pinault, and the French midfielder had all the time in the world to play Danny Forrest in behind the sleeping Derek Duncan. Forrest’s first-time shot beat James Pullen all ends up and cannoned into the net off the underside of the bar.

Even the goal failed to rouse the Dons from their slumber, and time and time again they gave the ball away, presenting Crawley with plenty of opportunities to further their advantage - which, thankfully, they failed to do. An unfortunate slip by Sam Hatton near the corner flag saw Ben Smith through on goal, but he fluffed his lines as the angle narrowed. Then Adam Quinn and Smith combined to put Louis through, but like his team-mates before him he wasted his opportunity.

The Dons seemed to be held together by Pullen, Inns and the indefatigable Danny Kedwell, but even the 12-goal man was finding life difficult, and Jon Main looked slightly the livelier of the striking pair. But Kedwell and Main were completely starved of service, as Duncan and Ricky Wellard’s combination down the left was looking ineffective, and the travelling supporters in the surprisingly low crowd of 2,204 began to pine for the departed Chris Hussey.

Pinault had another decent attempt on goal just before half-time, but from the goal-kick that followed, the Dons finally strung together a decent move, Wellard’s strong run setting up Luke Moore’s dangerous cross which was cleared just as Main shaped up to shoot. But with two minutes to the interval, the Dons drew level. Hatton beat one defender with a fine dummy, and his 25-yard low drive found the bottom corner past Simon Rayner’s slightly late-looking dive. Five decent minutes out of the first 45 had, somewhat undeservedly, been enough.

Wellard’s withdrawal seven minutes into the second half was the spark that ignited the tie. Adjei, immensely strong and hard to shake off the ball, where Wellard had been tentative and easy meat for Town’s former Brentford midfielder Eddie Hutchinson in particular, immediately imposed himself on the game, taking charge of the midfield, freeing Steven Gregory from his first-half shackles and bringing Moore and Lewis Taylor into a match in which they had barely been noticed. Both Moore and Taylor were now causing the Crawley full-backs problems, and Kedwell and Main were finding space as Town’s centre-halves were drawn wider and wider in support of their defensive flankmen.

Moore’s dart down the left nearly gave the Dons the lead as his cross deflected off two Crawley defenders and dribbled narrowly wide. Then two Taylor crosses produced shots from Gregory and Moore, which were blocked, and Moore had another effort charged down. The Dons finally looked on top of a game that could have been out of their reach. Adjei again was at the heart of everything Wimbledon were doing right, winning possession from Quinn and Hutchinson in quick succession and showing the fighting spirit that the Dons’ first-half performance had been sadly lacking.

Main’s fine turn and shot deserved a better outcome than hitting Rayner’s near post as Wimbledon threatened to turn their second-half dominance into a First Round place. And the striker was soon at the centre of the only contentious incident of the game: with 15 minutes left, he was clearly held back as he attempted a cross from the junction of byline and six-yard box. But the referee refused the Dons players’ and fans’ frantic appeals, and instead awarded a corner. Wimbledon have had a season’s worth of penalties already, but this was as blatant as any of those awarded: Main was felled by a tackle and pull from behind, but the otherwise excellent referee saw nothing wrong.

This, as it turned out, was the visitors’ best chance of winning the tie. Crawley, perhaps sensing that they were now the team lucky still to be in the game, raised themselves for one last wave of attacks. Callum Willock, the striker who nearly became a Wimbledon player in the summer, came on for the tiring Louis, whose pale imitations of Didier Drogba had hardly endeared him to the Dons fans, and Willock’s muscular presence was a late handful for Inns and Brett Johnson. Twice Willock set up shooting opportunities for Forrest and fellow sub Michael Malcolm, but their finishing wasn’t up to scratch.

And so the Dons held on for a place in Sunday’s draw. If Tuesday’s replay follows the pattern of the previous two meetings between the sides this season, we could be in for a long night.