Photographs from the crucial Premier League clash with Birmingham City on Saturday 19 March. It was a variously tense and exciting afternoon, especially when things picked up in the second half.

The best of these pics will be available on the Illarterate Flickr channel soon, so check that out if you get the chance.

Maynor Figueroa doesn't score insignificant goals

2.35pm at the DW concourse, and all eyes were on West Ham’s battling performance against Champions League contenders Tottenham at White Hart Lane. It most likely will have gone unnoticed, but it was around this time that the starting lineups for Wigan’s clash with Birmingham were announced over the stadium tannoy. Had they been paying full attention, I’m fairly sure thousands of Wiganers transfixed by those tellies would have let out a large groan en masse when it was confirmed that Franco Di Santo would start ahead of both Rodallega and Sammon.

It wasn’t a huge surprise, all told, and undoubtedly the safe, conservative option once it became clear Hugo could not last the full 90 minutes. Safe, however, won’t get you the goals. Conservative won’t turn a draw into a win, a fact borne out in 60 minutes of football at the DW Stadium this afternoon. Thank goodness things changed from thereon in, and how.

You probably know by now that I wanted Wigan to start this game pretty much as they finished against Manchester City two weeks ago, with two front men that can actually pose a threat to the opposition goalmouth; it’s what we’ve been lacking for much, if not all of this season. Instead, we were forced to settle for Di Santo and his continued struggle to win the ball, let alone create any chances of note on his own against four opposition defenders. He looked lethargic and strangled, outnumbered by a physical Birmingham backline that ate the Argentinian for breakfast, dinner and tea. It simply wasn’t working, something even Derek Acorah would have been able to predict with ease.

As if to underline Latics’ problems, Liam Ridgewell cropped up on 6 minutes to slot home via the head of Jiranek. You could say Wigan should have cleared the initial free kick, which ultimately led to the goal, wasn’t fully dealt with, but then you could also say the former Villa man was in an offside position. Whatever, it was a goal, and a blow to the home side’s confidence from which they took a while to recover.

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James McCarthy battles with Guillermo Molins (Credit: Bernard Platt)

They may have a gap in their competitive calendar for a couple of weeks, but Latics have been keeping busy with a training camp in La Manga and a low key friendly with Swedish champions Malmo FF back home in Wigan this weekend. Though Latics dominated the first half, the visitors ran out 3-1 victors with goals from Wilton Figueiredo, Jimmy Durmaz and Daniel Larsson. Wigan’s goal came via Guillermo Molins, who inadvertently turned the ball into his own net late on, but the damage was already done by the 67th minute.

In the second half Wigan changed from their more regular line-up and lost command. Malmo ruled the game and the result was written to 1-3 after a magnificent Molins own goal. – Swedish tabloid Aftonbladet

Roberto Martinez used this opportunity to experiment with a few different lineups, including a rather intriguing 4-3-3 formation which, according to Malmo-based newspaper Sydsvenskan, resulted in some ‘tough English football’. Although that very same media outlet reported Wigan as fielding “all their regular players”, we can only ascertain from the limited Internet coverage available –the game was played behind closed doors without the knowledge of local media or supporters– that Victor Moses, James McCarthy, Conor Sammon, Steven Caldwell, James McArthur and Jordi Gomez figured for certain. Hugo Rodallega, our main source of goals this season, did not feature at all, leading one to think that our attacking line would most likely have comprised of Conor Sammon and/or Franco Di Santo as Martinez looked to give the majority of his first team a run out.

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Conor Sammon, the potential saviour (Credit: Alasdair Middleton)

Isn’t it funny how one heavy loss –which, I must reiterate, was largely expected– can change the mood at a club to such an extent? Well, I say ‘club’ when I mean ‘the fans’, because after the shenanigans of last week, Roberto remained as philosophical as ever. Should we expect anything else? The guy’s a true professional, certainly cut out for the highest level even if his team isn’t playing that way right now. Might be a few years before we see Bob make some progress in the Premier League (or even elsewhere in Europe, probably his Spanish homeland), but it feels like we’re the guinea pigs right now.

Forget that feeling of helplessness for the moment, for in much the same way one loss can make us all so horribly pessimistic we wouldn’t be out of place at a Coldplay concert (two Coldplay digs in two weeks! I believe that’s a JWAW record), it only takes one big performance –and by that I mean a win– for a whole different perspective to be cast upon our season. One result on its own wouldn’t keep us up, but the confidence it could instil would stand us in good stead for the proverbial mountain we have yet to climb.

And yes, I would call it a mountain. The main problem is that there are teams better set for survival than the vulnerable tactics we’re locked into for the remainder of the season – namely they have guys that can score goals and are set up to do so. They have forward-thinking players used to occupying the traditional scoring outlets and favour goals over performances. In our favour, we’re now all but back to full strength and, thanks to that Clattenburg fellow (thank goodness he was so scared to brandish his cards), were free of suspension worries for today’s game – we were gonna need everyone and more for this.

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