REPORT: Wigan Athletic 0 Sunderland 2

Sunderland, having made eight changes, compared to Wigan's nine, started the brighter, and were asking questions right from the off.

A bouncing ball 25 yards out from the Latics goal was taken on by Aiden O'Brien, whose effort flashed past the post with Ben Amos - who kept his place, alongside Jordan Cousins - at full stretch.

But Latics were struggling to get anything going in attack, and fell behind on 26 minutes.

O'Brien looked to be clearly offside as he chased a big boot downfield, but he wisely left the ball for Nathan Broadhead, who raced through and beat Amos with a cool finish.

It was almost 2-0 moments later when Dennis Cirkin was allowed to run through the heart of the Latics side before shooting.

He was only denied by a brilliant tip over from Amos, who was clearly not happy with what was happening in front of him.

Wigan dodged another bullet when a mistake from Jason Kerr - making his debut after a deadline day move from St Johnstone - allowed Leon Dajaku to race through on goal.

Amos again did well to stand him up, and the chance had gone.

Leam Richardson would have been delighted to get his troops in at the break only one goal down.

But the second period was more of the same, with the visitors looking far more likely to score more than Wigan were to pull one back.

The second goal that Sunderland undoubtedly deserved arrived nine minutes after the restart, when Luke O'Nien finished off a lovely move with a cool finish.

And only desperate blocks from Kerr and Curtis Tilt prevented more damage being down in the final quarter.

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