Wigan Snoozefest

Saturday 5th March 2022: DW Stadium: League One: Wigan Athletic vs AFC Wimbledon

To open up my football travels for March I headed back to football at Wigan for the second time this season. The first time I went to the DW was back on September 11th 2021 for the visit of Doncaster Rovers and that was the match that inspired me to begin writing this blog. It’s a good thing that game was inspiring as the match I went too this time was anything but.

The match I headed to the DW this time was the visit of relegation threatened AFC Wimbledon. The visitors came into the match in 20th place, just 2 points above the drop zone and having not won a match in 3 months. They had an up-turn in form last weekend though as they came into this match off the back of a 2-2 draw with Doncaster Rovers. They had come back from 2-0 down at the hour mark to draw in that one so there were green shoots of recovery in their season but how would it go today.

Their hosts are riding high coming into this one placed 2nd in the league and just 7 points behind league leaders Rotherham with 2 games in hand over them. They beat Fleetwood 2-0 in midweek to start their March off on a winning note. The end of the match didn’t go quite the way they would’ve hoped as James McClean got himself sent off in the 97th minute. Even without him available though I had no doubt that the home side would waltz their way to winning this one.

Despite my feelings on how this game was obviously going to go I headed off to the match in a good mood. My mood was even sustained despite the fact that a faster train to Wigan than mine left minutes earlier from the platform opposite me. I couldn’t use that train because of the way my ticket was booked and then my train got delayed by 5 minutes too. My mood remained excellent though despite these issues.

To get to the DW you can head to either Wigan Wallgate or Wigan Northwestern stations if you’re coming in by train as they’re on opposite sides of the street from each other. From either you head under the bridge and just follow the road round till you reach the huge roundabout with the Fire Station. At the fire station roundabout you need to take the Asda exit and 2 minutes down that road you turn into the retail park and head diagonally across the park in the direction of the double arches of the DW. The whole walk takes just 15 minutes from the station and if you’re driving you can find a parking spot no problem. The retail park and the attached leisure centre provide so much parking that no matter how late you get there you will always be able to find a space.

For my part I had given myself so much time to get to the stadium that even with the delay on my journey I arrived at the ground an hour before the match. I headed straight to the ticket office round the left side of the stadium and picked up my £20 ticket to the Springfield stand, skipping past the club shop and a programme seller on my way that I doubled back too. The ticket office is cash or card but the programmes are cash only, so just bear that in mind if you’re heading to matches here.

I grabbed a burger before taking a lap of the stadium trying to find the right turnstile to head inside. On this lap I stopped by the statue of Dave Whelan outside the reception, this man was the owner when the Latics won the FA Cup back in 2008. That was also the season they got relegated from the Premier League, but it’s still their most recent success and it’s awesome to see them celebrating it. Finding the turnstile wasn’t easy though as there was no turnstile mentioned on the ticket, so I just found a turnstile into the Springfield stand and headed inside. There were no bag checks on the home turnstiles, but it was a squeeze getting through with one on my back.

The concourse was a wide tunnel with no way out. To the left there are pre-order machines that you can use to buy food and drinks for anytime in the match upto the end of half time. Wigan still have some work to do on getting the word out about these though as they were marooned in a sea of isolation. For the food kiosks themselves you will need your card with you as they do not accept cash. I grabbed a drink then careered down the stairs to my seat in the stands, just a couple of seats to the left of the dugouts, almost directly on halfway and a mere 5 rows back from the pitch. Thank you to Declan at the ticket office for such a great seat.

The DW stadium is a classic modern bowl stadium, but here you enter half way down the bowl and have to know where your seat is in order to get to it. Unlike other bowl stadium’s it is not linked up all the way round, with gaps between each stand. On the pitch the visiting Dons were warming up directly in front of me in their all red away strip, with Wigan warming up away to my right in their blue and white kit.

Away fans at the DW are given free reign of the stand away to the left side of me, in the springfield stand, but the Dons were not making much use of it for this match with barely a quarter of the seats actually in use. To my intense joy, after my experience at Prenton Park recently, the DW has two huge screens in opposite corners of the stadium that can be seen by all the fans inside. There was even a large rectangular dot-matrix screen at the back of the stand opposite me that showed both the match clock and match score throughout the match.

The announcement of the teams a strange one on me as they announced the starting 11’s of both teams at a whisper but also extremely slowly, which gave me time to figure out who they were talking about. Wigan also take their loyalty to sponsors a step further than I have seen from any other team in the country by announcing the sponsor for each player before the name of the player themselves. Most teams stick to just having the player’s sponsors written next to their names in the get to know the team section of the programme, it was surreal. There was one good thing in the announcement though as they announced both of the team’s captains, an honour usually reserved for the home side.

In the Dons’ starting line-up was Sam Cosgrove, one of those introduced to the crowd when I visited Plough Lane back at the beginning of the year. Having been intrigued by this new striker when he was unveiled at that match I was now looking forward to seeing him in action against the Latics, who he had once been of the books of without actually appearing in a competitive match for them.

Leam Richardson in the home dugout emerged before the teams to accept a standing ovation from all 4 stands. I could not understand why the away fans were applauding him at the time and my research after the match has been no more illuminating. He only played a single season outside the north-west during his career on the pitch and this was on loan at Notts County. Whilst his management credits encompass only his ex-team Accrington Stanley before he took the job in the Wigan dugout. If anyone out there understands why the away fans were applauding him then congrats as I still have no idea.

That was the last act before the match kicked off, but it would also be the high point of the action for a while as it quickly became clear that this was not going to be a high quality affair. Wigan were on top early but lacked the quality in the final third to threaten the Don’s goal and the Don’s simply could not find an out ball to get themselves a foothold in the game.

Despite this early possession it took till the 10th minute for the latics to have their first decent shot on goal and even then it didn’t come from open play. The visitors conceded a free-kick 12 yards from goal near the left touchline and once Wigan had laid it off to the right to get a better angle they thumped the shot into the side netting. Now all the match needed was a shot from open play.

Just before that chance for the hosts they had something a little less enjoyable to deal with as Glen Rea went down on halfway. The physios rushed on to attend to him and the home fans breathed a sigh of relief when they passed him as able to continue. Why he went down I do not know, but that was because the match itself had not gripped me yet and unfortunately it never would.

The visitors did create a chance of their own in the 13th minute, but it was completely against the run of play as they had barely touched the ball upto this point. Their chance wasn’t very threatening though and I think it only made my notes as it was the first time they had made it past the halfway line in the game. Paul Osew was the Man with the chance and it was a cross from the left that flew straight into the arms of Jamie Jones in the Wigan goal. It was the best that Don’s had created so far though so it caught my attention.

The attention of the home fans will have been caught instead by Glen Rea hitting the turf as Jones caught the ball and this time there was no relief. Rea was unable to continue this time and in just the 14th minute of the match Wigan were forced into their first change of the match. The replacement that Richardson went for was Tom Bayliss and we will see if he had any effect on the match as this blog continues on its merry way.

Wigan created their next chance from a corner in the 18th minute. They swung the ball in from the right to the back post, once there it was tapped back across the box and with the visitors defence in disarray all Stephen Humphrys had to do was slot it home from point blank range in the centre of the 6 yard box. He couldn’t do it and instead sent the ball cannoning off the post and back into the forest of legs in the area, from where the reconstituted Don’s defence was eventually able to hack it clear.

The hosts were back in the Don’s area just 2 minutes later though a defence splitter by Will Keane was collected by Humphrys, only for it to be picked off his toes seconds later by a well timed tackle by a visiting defender. If that tackle had been mistimed I would have noted who made it as they would likely have been collecting a red card for Denying a clear goal-scoring opportunity, but it was well timed and thus I made no note of who made it.

This failure did not deter the hosts as they were back again in the next minute, determined to give the visitors no rest. This proved to be an excellent tactic as I bring you the tale of how Wigan took the lead with this attack in the 21st minute of the match. The hosts unleased a powerful shot from the edge of the box and despite getting his body squarely behind it Nik Tzanev, the Don’s keeper, was unable to hold it. He dropped it to the feet of Keane, who had followed in the original shot, and he made no mistake from 4 yards out slotting it away to give Wigan the lead. If he had messed it up at least his nearest teammate was Humphrys, who would’ve had no leg to stand on after his earlier miss.

Having taken the lead Wigan seemed content to let the match limp towards the half hour mark, with the only actions of note being comical ones. First Wigan had a freekick on the edge of their own area that they dithered over taking. They must have changed the taker of it at least 6 times before the ref ordered them to get on with it and then they thumped it upfield, straight to the feet of a Don’s defender who sent it right back where it came from. Second a Wigan cross from the left was cleared from under the bar by Paul Kalambyi for the visitors only for his teammates to slam the clearance between the shoulder blades of the ref.

That clearance was indicative of the lack of quality offered by the visitors who had yet to create a single decent chance and were even struggling to retain possession of the ball for any prolonged period of the match. They only gained possession of the ball in the 35th minute when a shambolic pass between the host’s centre-backs landed at Cosgrove’s feet, but even the Dons dithered on the ball for long enough to allow Wigan to recover their defensive shape and block the resulting cross from the left and clear the ball.

Wigan continued their dominance of the ball from this point till the penultimate minute of the half, but in this time they only created one half -decent chance when Joe Bennet fired towards goal from the edge of the box. Though even this failed to hit the target as it was deflected off the visiting defenders for a corner that was poked goalwards but rebounded off the forest of legs to the edge of the area. From there sit was lashed back towards goal but that shot met the same fate as it’s predecessor.

When the Don’s got their next touch of the ball in the 44th minute and created their first truly decent opening of the match. A cross from the right landed on Cosgrove’s forehead just 8 yards out and whilst his header had the keeper beaten all ends up it failed to beat his marker who readjusted to send the ball clear of the box just 2 yards from the line. Having created this chance it seemed the Don’s though half-time had come early as they downed tools and let Wigan have another chance. Keane was given the freedom of the DW to advance down the centre of the pitch till he just had Tzanev to beat, but his contact on the shot was lighter than being tickled with a feather and the ball dribbled into Tzanev’s arms.

That was the last action of an abysmal first half of football that Wigan had still somehow managed to find a goal in. The ref had done little to help the flow of the game as he whistled up at every opportunity as though he was getting a bonus dependant on there being 50 freekick in each half. Given this it was shocking to me that he took no action at all against Cosgrove when he caught his marker in the face with his elbow in the 42nd minute, but that incident seemed to escape his notice.

I stepped out on the concourse at half-time and spent the time looking at the scores around the grounds at the rest of the days matches. The only one I remember is that MK were leading Rotherham 1-0 at half-time as they kept the pressure on Wigan for the automatic promotion places.

As the hosts emerged for the second half I was shocked to see that neither manager had made any changes during the break. Surely they couldn’t both be happy with the first half display? I certainly hadn’t been.

The Don’s emerged from a blind spot for the restart. I looked up at one point and they were just there on the field. Not that it mattered early on as Wigan attacked straight from kick-off, but that attack petered out before it could threaten the visitor’s goal. Neither team created any chances of note in the first 5 minutes of the new half, but Cosgrove did get away with making contact with his marker’s face once more though. This time it was the palm of his hand instead of his elbow, but in most games both would have merited at least a yellow card. Luckily for Cosgrove and the visitors though the ref was oblivious to both of them in this game.

It fell to the hosts to have the first chances of the second half and when they came they arrived as a pair in back to back minutes. The first of the pair arrived in the 52nd minute when Gwion Edwards won a battle to break free on the right and advanced into the box before thumping a shot towards goal. Tzanev was equal to it as it hurtled straight down his throat and although he couldn’t hold it he was able to punch it behind. The cannoned shot from the D that came from the corner deflected out off a Wigan Man for a goalkick.

The second chance of the pair came through Humphrys who came charging down the left hand side and failed to look up before unleashing a shot across goal that Tzanev was able to save with his legs. If Humphrys had taken a second to acquaint himself with his surroundings before taking a shot at glory he would have have seen a teammate unmarked in the box who had the simplest tap-in I have ever seen on my football travels ready to go. In keeping with the rest of the match though that moment of composure and quality was left missing in action.

This lack of awareness for teammates, the lack of quality passes all over the pitch and the dearth of a decent set of finishing boots from any of the players was infuriating me at this point to the extent that I started checking my emails. The officials had also begun to drift off and so they tackled this by whistling up for every tackle or misplaced pass. It added some hilarity to the match but it also risked turning the whole thing into a huge farce. This was not helped just before the hour mark by a soft freekick that was given to the hosts in their own box when they had Humphrys setting them on the break down the right. Just let the match flow ref please.

In the 66th minute Mark Robinson in the away dugout finally made a move to mix-up the action and perhaps even allow the Dons to establish a foothold in the match. The way that Robinson decided would accomplish this best was to replace Jack Rudoni with Daniel Csoka. Despite this it was the hosts who had the next attack,5 minutes later, and once again it came through Humphrys down the right hand side. This time he looked up and chipped the ball to Max Power at the back post who headed it straight down into the ground and into Tzanez’s arms.

This was the final goal-mouth action of the match as the match limped to its conclusion, but in the meantime both teams made 2 substitutes each. The visitors replaced George Marsh and Ayoub Assal with Anthony Hartigan and Terry Ablade. The hosts for their part removed Joe Bennett and Callum Lang, who trudged off the pitch moving like flowing trudge in the middle of a Siberian winter, and brought on Tom Pearce and Gavin Massey.

Entering the final 5 minutes neither team had looked like creating a decent opening for ages let alone actually scoring a goal as they both seemed to be begging for the final whistle to be blown as soon as possible. In the stands I wanted it to be blown sooner than that just to put me out of my misery. Max Power would not have to wait the final 5 minutes to escape this game as he went down holding his left arm in the 86th minute and he appeared to be in an awful lot of pain. The physios decided after a short burst of treatment that he would not be able to continue and the hosts lost their second player of the match to injury. This time though they could not bring on anyone to take his place as they had already used up their substitution quota. They didn’t seem to care about the numerical disadvantage they were left with and with the way this match was going they had no reason to.

The most interesting incident of the whole 90minutes occurred in the final one of those regulation minutes when Humphrys was once again running free towards goal. This time though he was blocked off by a frustrated Paul Kalambayi. This was the clearest freekick of the match and the ref did manage to give it. He then reached into his pocket and when his hand reappeared it was carrying a red card which was brandished to Kalambayi as the last man and for denial of a clear goal-scoring opportunity. It appeared to me to be a stonewall red card and the first time the ref had been un-ambiguously correct in his decision making all match.

The lino had a different opinion though and after a 2 second chat with him so did the ref. After that chat he returned to the scene of the incident and rescinded the red card, then went one step further and reversed the freekick too. He eventually settled on giving a free kick to the Dons instead, but the reasons why the got the freekick are anyone’s guess. I still have no idea what the reason for this swift u-turn was but the ref was not about to explain it either. I have never been so confused about a turn of events on a football pitch.

I was still trying to decipher that turn of events as Wigan created the only change of the 3 tortuous minutes of injury time. They had the goal at their mercy just 3 yards out and with the keeper beaten, but instead of just tapping it home they went for the backheel instead and predictably it went comically wrong. Why they went for the theatrical there when they hadn’t managed to execute simple finishes throughout the rest of the game. The ball slowed to a snail’s pace allowing Tzanev to recover and scoop it up before it had covered a third of it’s required distance.

That was the last act of the match as the ref put the fans out of our misery, particularly the away fans who had travelled up from south London only to see their team fail to keep possession of the ball for any decent period of time let alone create a decent chance. That is an incredibly long journey for such an abysmal performance. My journey was much shorter than the away fans but I still felt that I had wasted my afternoon with this match.

My next blog comes from far further south than this one in the northern reaches of the midlands as I fullfill a childhood dream to see Nottingham Forest in action on the banks of the picturesque river Trent.