Fleetwood Town 3 Wigan Athletic 2

Joe Garner puts Latics 2-0 up from the penalty spot before Fleetwood's comeback

Wigan Athletic kicked-off their 2020/21 campaign in defeat, bowing out of the Carabao Cup in a five-goal thriller at Fleetwood having led through a Joe Garner brace inside half-an-hour.

Latics were ahead with only 75 seconds on the clock when Tom Pearce's cross from the left was controlled superbly and then smashed home by Garner.

It was almost 2-0 inside three minutes, Kal Naismith's pull-back finding Gary Roberts, whose shot was blocked by a defender on the line.

At the other end, Jamie Jones saved well from Josh Morris, only for the ball to fall to Harvey Saunders, who fired well over from 12 yards.

Naismith was looking dangerous every time he got in down the left, and he saw another decent effort well saved after cutting inside.

Great stuff from Roberts and Viv Solomon-Otabur saw the ball find Garner, whose shot was well saved by the goalkeeper.

Garner then might have done better when he was in on goal but could only stab the ball wide of the left-hand post.

But the stand-in skipper made amends on the half-hour mark when he was fouled in the area, and picked himself up to send the goalkeeper the wrong way from the spot.

Fleetwood had hardly been in the game up to this point, but were handed a lifeline when Ched Evans pulled one back with his first touch after coming on, sending a close-range header past the helpless Jones.

It was inches away from becoming 3-1 when a curling strike from Roberts, from the edge of the box, beat the goalkeeper but came back off the bar.

But the visitors were given a huge shock right on the stroke of half-time when Jones brilliantly tipped an Evans header round the post, before saving a shot from the Fleetwood striker on the goalline from the resulting corner.

Roberts had another chance to make it 3-1 only to fire over the top, before Fleetwood gained a real stranglehold on the game.

They found an equaliser on 64 minutes when Morris raced down the middle, and even had time to cut back and settle himself before smashing past Jones.

And the home side went in front for the first time with 13 minutes to go when another fine header from Evans was too good for Jones and found the corner of the net.

With Latics struggling to put anything together, Fleetwood almost found a fourth goal in the closing stages.

The dangerous Evans fired just wide of the far post, before forcing a fine save from Jones at the near post with seconds to go.