Match action(?)

In a season such as this, managers are caught between two rather large, and in some cases expensive, stools when it comes to the FA Cup. It’s the oft-touted story; to use the competition as an opportunity for fringe team players to gain much needed match practice in preparation for challenges to come, or treat it as you would a Premier League match and go out all guns blazing in an attempt to win the thing outright?

Whilst the latter might not apply in the case of Wigan Athletic, especially in the 2010–11 season, it is somewhat tempting to get caught up in the hype and emotion surrounding the competition. On this occasion, I think it would be foolish to plump for all out attack and somewhat unusual considering the sides fielded by Martinez in the Carling Cup earlier this season. In the event, fringe players were enough to overcome Hartlepool, Preston and Swansea, but not Arsenal. Still, a decent run, you would say, especially because it wasn’t all plain sailing even if Latics might have seemed the slightest bit clinical for the first time under Big Rob.

These occasions tend to boil down to the ‘glass half full/empty’ situation. If you’re the positive type, then you’d be pleased with either a win or a loss. Whilst you can’t ever really be happy with a losing team, especially against Championship opposition, a win would mean more distraction from the real prize this season, namely retaining our place in the Premier League. I’m not entirely sure in which camp I would pitch a tent, though I’m the old fashioned type that revels in a Latics win no matter what competition in which it may come. One thing’s for sure, though – nobody concerned wants a replay.

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A bit late, but as they say, that’s better than never at all. Or, considering the quality of my photography, maybe it isn’t. I will say my pics are actually getting better, perhaps aided by that fancy new forty quid camera I shelled out for, but still nowhere near any sort of journalistic standard.

Not to be making excuses for the recent general lack of updates, but the absence of league action makes you kind of unenthusiastic, even lackadaisical at times. Besides, it’s close season and I wanted a rest, you hear? Expect to be fully updated on arrangements for JWAW in 2010/11 sometime in the near future. Meanwhile, enjoy these snaps from the Latics-Hull encounter back in May.

As ever, a selection of the best of these is available in higher quality on the Illarterate Flickr channel. 100kb-plus versions of most of my photos from last season can also be obtained by contacting me.

Still to come is media from the Arsenal game, though considering my recent workload I wouldn’t hold your breath for anything in the next few days. Still, I may surprise you.

Stojkovic takes the phrase 'Jesus Was a Wiganer' a bit too literally

With Latics’ survival sealed prior to this afternoon’s engagement, it only remained to be seen whether Hull would absolutely trounce them to carry a sliver of hope into the final week of the season.

Well, this didn’t happen and, if we’re being honest, wasn’t really likely to, but thanks to the antics of a certain Serbian, it may well have been. In terms of possession and control of the game, the visitors never really outplayed a Latics side missing N’Zogbia, Bramble, Kirkland, Moreno and Thomas. But stand-in keeper Vladimir Stojkovic, who looked very shaky in the Wigan goal, could be blamed for at least one of the goals the Tigers would claw from the very hands of Wigan’s backline; in truth, had Hull challenged the opposition goalmouth more often, things could have been far worse.

In the cold light of day, a draw against a pretty-much-relegated side also with their fair share of absentees –most notably a particular Londonite who can’t stand the North (just joking Jimmy)–, was an average result played out by, some might say, an average team. It certainly wasn’t a sparkling performance from the Latics, and had there been more weight on this game things would have been far past ‘squeaky bum time’ (for which I daren’t print an analogy) midway through the second half as Wigan somehow contrived to concede two goals.

There is a small excuse – and it is quite a small one – for the first: a slightly overzealous linesman flagging offside before changing his mind after the ball was nestling in the Wigan net, which he had every right to do. He was proven to be right in his error correction, but there’s no doubt it caused an element of confusion amongst Caldwell, Gohouri et al as for a moment Latics were guilty of playing to the whistle.

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The 'sparse' West Stand

A rare successful foray into first team experimentation for Roberto got the decade off to an excellent start for the club, but it was a familiar face that helped turn the tide for the Latics. Care to guess, though, how the BBC reported this match? I’ll give you one try.

The mainstream media outlets had a good old-fashioned field day, hauling out the tried and tested ‘Little Wigan, paltry attendances’ angle just because many fans decided they’d rather be in the pub or something. As a result, a little over 5,000 witnessed Latics’ biggest win of the campaign thus far, even if it wasn’t in the Prem.

The ten thousand-odd ‘missing’ people that decided not to brave the bitterly cold weather may wish they’d made the trip to the DW to see perhaps Wigan’s best performance of the season. Goal wise, it was certainly so, but with a hint of good fortune thrown in there as well. But was it really worth getting frozen feet for? Well yes, actually, but only really in the second 45.

Scott Sinclair made much of Wigan’s early running, causing Hull many problems on the wing and pressing his case for a first team start in Mohamed Diame’s continued absence from the midfield. For all their sprightliness in the first 20 minutes, however, the closest Wigan would come in the first half was a shot-come-cross courtesy of the aforementioned Sinclair pretty early on in the piece.

The remaining 30 minutes weren’t exactly vintage Latics, and a lineup that saw many serial bench-warmers get their chance looked to be slowly crumpling under the pressure of first team football. A string of Hull free kicks in shooting vicinity around the 35 minute mark saw Geovanni slot a decent free kick past stand-in ‘keeper Mike Pollitt to send the Tigers into the half time interval with a deserved one-goal cushion.

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