Roberto will repay Whelan's faith

Following 48 hours of intense speculation over the Spaniard’s future, Roberto Martinez has opted to stay at Wigan Athletic, putting pen to paper in a contract that will keep him at the club for three more years. It is thought Martinez rejected a deal with Aston Villa worth around twice his current contract because of the faith chairman Dave Whelan has placed in him over the course of his time at Wigan.

In a crunch 12pm meeting at the DW Stadium, Martinez confirmed his decision to Whelan, who has remained confident the Balaguer-born would stay. Prior to the meeting, Sky Sports News briefly spoke to Whelan, who said of Martinez:

“Roberto is not a greedy man. Managers have a reputation for greed, but Roberto has sentiment, he has feeling and a great admiration for Wigan Athletic.”

Aston Villa did not enter into extended talks as Martinez “wanted to honour his contract” with the Lancashire club, according to an official statement. The Midlands outfit will now be forced to look elsewhere to fill their vacant managerial position.

“Given that he had one year remaining on his contract at Wigan, we made an official approach through the proper channels, though we were aware of a commitment he had made to his Club to agree and sign a new contract following the final game of last season.” — Aston Villa club statement, avfc.co.uk

We can assume the Latics boss made a verbal agreement with Whelan immediately following the season’s end to remain at Latics. However, we all know this would mean little if the right contract came along. The precise details of Villa’s offer can only be speculated; perhaps the Spaniard is holding out for a better contract further down the line? More likely, the fact he “did not meet” with Aston Villa representatives seems to suggest he is staying staunchly faithful to the club that brought him to British football, for the moment at least.

Whelan: "Roberto is showing football is not about greed, there's loyalty in it"

“Roberto is staying, that’s the great news. I had a gut feeling he wanted to stay at Wigan. He’s signing a new 3-year contract; we’ve had to give him an increase in basic salary, but money is not what this has been about. Villa will be disappointed, but I’m over the moon and I’m sure Wigan supporters will be too.

“Roberto is such a straight guy, honest and easy to deal with. Money is an afterthought to him. We got a quick agreement.

“I don’t think we were really close to losing him. We all know he’s going places, Aston Villa are a big club, and when you have a club like that coming for you, it’s something to be proud of. But had he gone to Villa I wouldn’t have blamed him. The supporters in Wigan look at this and think, Roberto is showing that football is not about greed, there’s a loyalty in it. He has been so loyal to me in all this.

“One of the big clubs in Europe will inevitably come for him, and then I would be resigned to losing him. I’m just relieved my gut feeling was right. I could feel the loyalty coming out of Roberto, it bubbled to the surface as soon as our meeting started. When they said Jesus is a Wiganer, Roberto is now a Wiganer.”

Dave Whelan

• Wigan Athletic Official statement

Roberto: Will he stay or will he go?

As soon as it became clear Gerard Houllier would not return to manage Aston Villa, rumours about who should replace him began to fly. One of those in the running was Wigan’s own Roberto Martinez, who was immediately instated as the bookies’ third favourite when chairman Randy Lerner expressed an interest in the Spaniard.

It has emerged today that Dave Whelan has given Martinez the opportunity to speak to the Villans, placing his future in the balance. On the one hand there is a contract extension offer from Latics, which he has been mulling over for some time, while on the other, the Midlands outfit will no doubt table a tempting proposition to bring Bob to Villa Park. Will he remain at the club that introduced him to British football or opt for a new challenge? Though Whelan reckons he’ll stay, I estimate the situation to be 50:50.

Despite Roberto’s strong affinity with Wigan, I very much doubt his decision will be clouded by nostalgia, and creative freedom may well be the determining factor. However, should Villa stump up the cash, I find it hard to see any other outcome than him leaving. It’s a nasty thought, as minds will be cast back to just over two years ago when Steve Bruce opted to leave for Sunderland. The Latics foundations began to crumble as a result, even if you could well argue that deterioration started as early as Christmas; whatever the case, his successor did a decent job of steadying the ship.

Big Brucey’s immediate departure after the 2008–09 season was somewhat inevitable. Roberto is in a different situation, having revived Wigan’s fortunes in the latter part of the season and finishing on a real high. Ever the professional, he may feel an obligation to honour his contract at the DW.

When Martinez was appointed Latics’ boss, one had the feeling his relative inexperience at the highest level could possibly mean disaster for Wigan. Dave Whelan placed total faith in his man, sticking by Roberto 100% through the tough times and never once intimating his position was in any danger. Even as other, seemingly more successful Premier League managers fell by the wayside, Roberto remained. This could edge the decision in Wigan’s favour, as he may never again find a chairman as patient as Uncle Dave.

Personally, I’m looking forward to another season under Martinez and am confident we can improve on our 16th place finish this coming campaign. Hopefully we shall see the continuation, or perhaps the culmination, of two years’ hard work rebuilding the team from the ground up. If Roberto leaves, we’d better get a decent replacement in there sharpish or else a mass exodus may result and we could be back to rebuilding once again.

Bob addresses his adoring fans

Roberto Martinez hosted his first fans forum as manager of Wigan Athletic in front of 350 supporters at the DW Stadium’s Fitness Lounge last night.

Unfortunately JWAW could not personally make it, but thanks to the wonders of the Internet (as in, the various Latics messageboards) we are able to bring you the general gist of the event.

If appropriating content is good enough for Rupert Murdoch then it’s sure as heck acceptable for a small-time weblog read by about five people (two of which passed away more than fifty years ago). Anyhow…

The evening was a chance for fans to pose questions about anything and everything to do with Wigan Athletic, and by all accounts Roberto was his usual honest self, answering all queries — which addressed a wide range of topics, from his style of play and tactics to Wigan’s status as a ‘selling club’ — calmly and with aplomb.

“There are no difficult questions” said Martinez to Latics Player’s Graham Lovett. “As long as everyone knows what we’re trying to do, it’s easy to find a real answer.”

“I’ve said it before, I want to know what the fans feel. All that we’re doing is for the fans. Unless we are together, we cannot share all our worries regarding the direction of the football club, and that’s vital.”

Amongst numerous other things, Roberto expressed his thoughts on Chris Kirkland and Titus Bramble, who, in his opinion, “should be in the England squad“. In the case of the former, he theorised it must only be a personal issue as opposed to lack of ability keeping Kirky out of the national setup.

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Now, where's me ink gone?

I’ll come clean: I wrote the following passage at around 1PM in anticipation of another Latics defeat. I wanted to try and get this post out of the way as soon as possible, as I predicted I would be too depressed to write it at 6PM. How wrong was I, eh?

Dear bloke on the radio (your name escapes me, please forgive me),

I write in reply to your opinion that ‘Wigan will go down this season’. Whilst there is a very good chance we shall be fighting in the lower half of the league – in fact I’d say it’s a certainty – we at the club are wholly and entirely behind our manager and understand that it will be more beneficial for us in the long term if we could, under Roberto Martinez, develop a style of play that will be more effective against the best the Premier League has to offer.

It is painfully evident that right now we do not have the resources to achieve said results, hence our recent drubbings at the hands of Manchester United and Arsenal. Given time and patience, however, I am hopeful Roberto can turn Wigan from also-rans to European competitors at the very least.

I’ll admit we aren’t likely to trouble said top six this year, however. Our season resumes against Hull next week, and a win from that game would put us on twelve points. Bearing in mind we have played three of the big four, Everton and Aston Villa in our first seven games of the season, I’d say this would be something of an expected outcome for a club in our position.

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