Wycombe Wanderers 1, MK Dons 1.

STUART Beavon struck an injury time equaliser as Wanderers snatched a point from the Bucks derby.

The final whistle was greeted as though Wanderers had won, with the Dons seemingly having the game in the bag.

A saved penalty from Nikki Bull looked as if it was going to count for nothing until Blues’ top scorer rescued his team with a 22nd goal of a fabulous season.

The Wanderers keeper made a great stop to keep out Jay O’Shea’s spot-kick early on as Blues looked to build on the momentum of their recent unbeaten run.

Less than a minute into the second half Daniel Powell looked as if he had settled the tie as Wanderers switched off at the back – but thanks to Beavon they got the point that extends the unbeaten run to five and keeps the belief alive.

Until the late drama, the game had had an unusually flat end to it as Wanderers failed to seriously worry visiting goalkeeper David Martin throughout the second half as the play-off chasing Dons looked like they were going to be able to see the game out.

With Paul Hayes’ loan spell brought to a premature conclusion and Matt Bloomfield and Dave Winfield injured, Gary Waddock changed back to the tried and trusted 4-4-2 formation as he opted to deploy Chris Hackett and former Don Anthony McNamee as wingers.

Within a minute Marvin McCoy had fired a warning shot across the bows after cutting inside, before Craig Eastmond’s through ball was cleverly dummied by Stuart Beavon for Ben Strevens, whose shot was blocked.

Wanderers started confidently against their Bucks rivals but ten minutes in the Dons were handed a penalty when McCoy bumped into Smith from behind and sent him to the ground. O’Shea stepped up but Bull guessed correctly and dived to his right to keep out his low strike, before scrambling to hold on to O’Shea’s attempt on the rebound.

It made the Dons striker the third man in a row to fail to get the better of Wanderers’ number one, after Giles Coke hit the post for Bury last week and Walsall’s Alex Nicholls had his spot kick saved at the beginning of February.

That miss pumped up the visitors and Stephen Gleeson looked to repeat his stunning 2008 play-off goal for Stockport at Adams Park as he unleashed a fierce drive from way out that skimmed the top of the net on its way over.

Many of the travelling fans thought it had dipped under the bar and Bull was certainly a beaten man on that occasion, but Wanderers’ number one produced another great save from O’Shea as he looked to finish off an incisive Dons counter attack.

The chance came barely seconds after Beavon had almost caught out David Martin with a long range daisycutter, but the Dons keeper clutched it at the second attempt with Strevens sliding in to score after Martin let the ball squirm from his grasp.

Wanderers were competing well against their high-flying neighbours and Grant Basey had a shot blocked by Matthias Doumbe, with Stuart Lewis firing the rebound wide.

Strevens then headed off target before O’Shea – desperate to get something right for his team – dipped one well wide as the game neared the interval.

There was still time for Wanderers to almost creep in front as Shaun Williams sliced his clearance towards goal, but Martin just about managed to claw it round the post for a corner.

Then Beavon broke the offside trap as the ball was dinked over the Dons defence by McNamee, but Blues’ top scorer hammered his shot just over from a difficult position.

But less than a minute after the restart, the visitors took the lead. O’Shea floated in a cross from the right that was misjudged by the otherwise outstanding Gary Doherty, and the ball broke for Daniel Powell to crash a shot into the bottom corner.

He almost made it a double shortly afterwards as Smith tracked back to rob Eastmond as he broke out of defence. The former England man then fed O’Shea on the left, and Bull had to be alert to make an excellent smothering block from Powell’s 12 yard shot.

Blues had a glorious chance to level from a corner when Strevens – whose tenacity had won the set piece in the first place – somehow nodded team-mate Doherty’s firm header over the bar with the goal gaping in front of him.

Doumbe, up from the back, produced a defender’s finish as he shot woefully over from six yards as Dons finally started to look like a side challenging for promotion.

It prompted Waddock to go back to three up front as Matt McClure and Gareth Ainsworth were introduced at the expense of the largely ineffective McNamee and Hackett.

The industrious Stuart Lewis was first to test Martin after the substitution, firing powerfully into his midriff from distance as a free-kick was cleared to him, before he went in the book for a lunging tackle on Dean Lewington.

But it wasn’t making much difference as the Dons were able to shut up shop and demonstrated their squad depth by bringing strikers Dean Bowditch and Jabo Ibehre off the bench, the latter coming on for Smith.

Nothing Blues could produce went on target as the visitors eventually managed to scramble clear from a McCoy throw-in and Doherty missed the target with a header from Ainsworth’s free-kick.

Indeed it was the franchise outfit who came closest to adding to the scoreline late on when Powell danced past a couple of defenders before shooting into the side netting.

That was until Beavon’s late, late intervention. Everybody including Bull had gone forward for a corner deep into the four added minutes that had been won by Strevens. It was Beavon who climbed highest to reach it, sending it beyond Martin’s grasp and into the top corner to spark wild celebrations around Adams Park.

Wanderers: Bull, McCoy, Laing, Doherty, Basey, Hackett (sub Ainsworth), Lewis, Eastmond, McNamee (sub McClure), Beavon, Strevens. Substitutes not used: Stewart, Scowen, Dunne.

Attendance: 5,572