Latics’ Honduran connection was out in force at the club shop today as Hendry Thomas and Maynor Figueroa were on hand to launch a limited edition poster celebrating Figs’ 60-yard goal against Stoke in December.

Attendees could also attempt to recreate the wonder strike out in the DW car park, where a training goal had been set up near the West Stand ticket office. As it transpired, not many managed to score — even from a distance ever so slightly shorter than sixty yards — though Hendry and Maynor had no problem at all.

A group of schoolkids, probably bussed in to ensure at least someone turned up on a Thursday afternoon, cheered heartily as Figueroa successfully placed the ball into the net just as he had done four months ago.

Read the rest of this entry »

James Milner snatched the Villa winner

As most anticipated, Aston Villa emerged with the spoils yesterday evening having looked the more likely in a game ultimately decided by a long-range second half James Milner effort.

But it wasn’t as if Latics were played off the park – far from it. They could have even been 1-0 up going into the break had James McCarthy’s fluffed clearance not found the back of his own net. It was a strange incident, as not only was he unchallenged, but he had sufficient time to let it fall to his feet for an easy boot out of play. As it was, McCarthy chose an overhead volley which failed spectacularly, somehow hooking its way past Chris Kirkland.

Wigan would hit back straight away, however, with McCarthy to some extent making up for his discrepancy by winning a free kick in a testing position just outside the Villa penalty area. An excellent delivery nodded in by the advancing Gary Caldwell brought Wigan level within a couple of minutes. Latics were visibly buoyed and exhibited an enhanced brightness, the culmination of which was Hugo Rodallega seeing his shot deflected wide of Friedel’s left hand post.

The sides had earlier traded blows with strikes from Maynor Figueroa and Gabriel Agbonlahor only finding the advertising hoardings behind the goal. The latter would have a frustrating evening characterised by an offside goal with the scores still level, but replays showed the linesman was correct to signal, even if there was less than a foot in it (much closer than, say, Jermain Defoe’s goal a few weeks earlier).

Villa settled down into a rhythm, however, and made Kirkland earn his money on numerous occasions, most notably with the last action of the first half; the keeper advanced off his line to fortuitously clear as Latics’ defence wobbled in the wake of the Villans’ pressure.

Brad Friedel, too, was tested on more than one occasion. Maynor Figueroa forced the Ohioan into a save low and to his right to prove Wigan weren’t just going to let Villa walk all over them like Liverpool had done to Portsmouth the night before.

Read the rest of this entry »

Parting of the Red Sea: glum faces all round for the 'Pool

Let’s get this out of the way first of all – Liverpool were, by their standards, rubbish. Their passing was sloppy — amongst the worst I’ve seen at the DW this season, in fact — their finishing and will to win largely lacking.

That’s not to say the Reds didn’t have their fair share of chances last night. The only problem was they couldn’t hit the target, and may I say (in a rather biased fashion) that it was nice to see someone other than Wigan struggle to do so at the DW Stadium. Perhaps the biggest culprit of all was Fernando Torres, who, in his five opportunities, never even managed to challenge Chris Kirkland. Two of them, on another day, he may well have slotted away to help Liverpool bury little Wigan like they ought to have.

I say ‘ought to have’ in a partly ironic fashion, as on balance, you’d have never known which team were battling for a top four place and which were fighting against relegation. In truth, Latics were deserved winners and the more likely to score all night, even if Liverpool did have some similarly decent opportunities.

Right, that’s out of my system now. This particular match report will differ from 90% of those that adorn the front pages of tabloids and fansites nationwide in that it will actually focus on the Wigan perspective, and how wonderful it is to grab a crucial, crucial, crucial three points. In fact it was so important I decided to repeat the word ‘crucial’ a couple of times there.

As I sit here, the ‘analysts’ on TalkSport are picking apart the substandard Liverpool performance, but I shall completely ignore that, for it smacks of paint-by-numbers journalism ever so slightly. Also this is a Wigan blog, so I dunno what else you might have expected from a bunch of biased northerners.

Enough of the big boy butt kissing, already!

Read the rest of this entry »

I swear, Alex, I have no idea where your biscuits have disappeared to...

Is Roberto Martinez in training to be the next Alex Ferguson or what?

Seasoned football watchers will be well versed in the big Scot’s blame-shifting tactics; the referee wasn’t fit enough to keep up; the fourth official didn’t add enough/added too much stoppage time; the grass was too long; somebody stole our half time Jaffa Cakes.

The problem is, Manchester United are one of the best sides in the country and Fergie can get away with it because he’s just so awesome. When Roberto Martinez attempts it, it looks, well, foolish. Unfortunately it smacks of desperation, something we really do not need to be making obvious to our fellow relegation battlers who will no doubt see this as weakness.

Mind you, it’s not as if Bob could focus on his team’s performance which, for the most part, wasn’t quite there. Much like against Bolton and Notts County (to name but a couple, actually), Latics had their best spell of pressure for about 25-30 minutes in the second half, and this would have been fine if it resulted in a goal. Problem is, it didn’t.

The first half, by contrast, was more circumspect. Wigan more than competed, but then we did at White Hart Lane in November and we all know what happened after that. Sorry for bringing that up yet again, because even though I didn’t/haven’t seen the game on Sky Sports yet I’m guessing Andy Gray et al did that enough yesterday afternoon – and all week, come to think of it.

Spurs probably had the better of the early stages with Wigan just coming into things in the latter part of the first period. Rodallega drew a fine save from Gomes and N’Zogbia sent a shot just over the Tottenham bar, which I suppose was a creditable effort. No goal, though, and Tottenham had one of their own on the 30-minute mark when Jermain Defoe broke free of the Latics’ offside trap to tap in at the back post. To be fair to the Wigan defence, they kept their line well and on this occasion just couldn’t keep up with Defoe’s pace.

Read the rest of this entry »