“Yo Death, my maaan! Shouldn’t you be at Aston Vill-aaaaagh!”

Not to be a party pooper, but I feel I must interject at this point. Remember a time long ago when we all cared about the league? Nah, me neither.

I don’t think I quite emphasised the importance of the Swansea game to Wigan’s Premier League survival. Hey, we all had other things on our minds last week so I suppose you could forgive a momentary lapse of concentration… or three. Don’t worry, I’m not going to bang on for 2,000 words about how the lack of Ramis and Alcaraz reduces the Wigan defence to a gibbering wreck, though to a certain extent I believe this to be true.

Instead, I shall speak at (moderate) length about this evening’s game and how Saturday afternoon affected it. Best get out your digestive biscuits and dunking beverage of choice for this one.

They say Wigan are the first team to win the FA Cup by accident, but I prefer to describe it as ‘everything falling into place’. The right draws, the right team selections, the right bit of luck here and there – three elements that have sadly been missing from Wigan’s league line-up at crucial points in the season. Antolin Alcaraz was supposed to miss the rest of the season, but he made a miraculous return to lead his team to FA Cup glory.

If Callum McManaman had been producing these kinds of performances in the first team from day one of the 2012-13 campaign, we might probably have been safe by January. And if Lionel Messi played for Wigan, we might have won the FA Cup. Oh, wait…

Screw the ifs, because barring a trip to the Large Hadron Collider, you can do precious little to change the past. Wigan had one more chance to fend off the Grim Reaper – if they could pull off an amazing win at Arsenal, that required points total of 41 would seem less of a pipe dream and a bit closer to reality. But the margin for error was negligible; quite simply, nought but perfection would suffice. Gulp.

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Wigan’s horseshoe collection, shortly before it was stolen by Alex Ferguson

Agh, must I write about this now? 18 painstaking hours of blanking out the memory will be undone in a fraction of that time tapping away at my chocolate-stained keyboard, but what the heck. I believe there is just enough space for brief reflection before we draw a line under this matter and move on to Wemb… ah, hahah! But that is a subject for another day (tomorrow, in fact), so I shall not mention it just yet, even if I feel the constant need.

So much right, yet so much wrong. At times Latics looked at though they could stick the ball in Swansea’s net at will and this was an utter joy to witness. It was all tempered, however, by the odd piece of chaotic defending that threatened to undermine the club’s very survival in The Greatest League in the World (©The Mainstream Media), and so it came to pass. Or, should I say, misplaced pass. (Yay, enough with the poor jokes – Ed.)

I dunno what happened there as I am my own editor so there is no need to add such comments. Anyhow, the injuries issue. Barring McArthur’s early season travails and tribulations, I can hardly remember a single midfield or forward that has suffered quite as much as our centre backs have collectively this season.

Respected up-and-coming footy journalistic type Danny Jamieson recently compiled a longlist of all the players that have had spells in the centre of defence in the past nine months or so, and it’s pretty populous. I won’t recite it here or my web bandwidth will be exceeded long before I am finished typing, but suffice to say any club so unsettled in such an integral position, even the very best of the best, would suffer to some extent.

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“I told you we should have taken out home insurance.”

The FA Cup Final is in just seven days, yet it felt a lifetime away as I nervously crossed yet another date off my calendar. Despite the prospect of silverware, there was no dancing in the streets quite yet, as Wigan Athletic had unfinished business to attend to. Nope, I ain’t talkin’ ’bout the 1986 Oscar-nominated film of the same name, I’m talkin’ bout our relegation (talking ’bout our reee-le-gation!)… scrap.

It’s strange how these match reports become more and more like those on the BBC Sport website as the tension racks up just a notch, forcing me to scramble for vaguely humorous references to lighten the mood. Oh wait, now I come to think of it I’ve been doing that since 2009. Like one does with the whole of the Daily Mail, just read on and forget I ever wrote this blasted paragraph.

You know the situation, but for the benefit of those reading this as a stand-alone article on your iPad 43.5 in 2025, I shall provide a bit of background info. Latics needed to win. That enough for ya, George Jetson?

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(c)Channel 4: Just believe.

Phew, it’s getting a bit tight now, isn’t it? As phenomenally demoralising as last weekend might have been, Latics once again had the chance to pull themselves clear of that media mosh pit that is the relegation zone. It sounds a bit weird, but just like last week, Aston Villa play on Monday so three points would have been enough to climb that crucial place to safety, at least for the remainder of the weekend. See, it’s like GCSE revision – if you look at things week-by-week, the task becomes just a bit easier.

Of course, lose and you’re sweating on the Villa result once again. I simply couldn’t rest easy from 5pm Saturday to 10pm Monday knowing that Latics might be six points away from 17th place by the time Tuesday rolls around, a considerable (but by no means completely insurmountable) gap to close with so few games remaining.

Oh go on then, I’ll dig out my favourite quote for you all to admire again:

“You are always one defeat away from a crisis. On that basis, we’re in deep doodoo.” — Villa manager John Gregory, 1999

Hahaaa! I shall never tire of that.

But as long as you keep the gap to three points there is still a chance, what with that increasingly apt final day Villa-Wigan showdown. My goodness, would I settle for a winner-takes-all situation now…

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