Wigan Athletic: The 12th Man: 'A lot of fans aren’t old enough to remember collecting for Stan McEwan’s wages in buckets, Bobby Campbell hitting the bar v Leeds or Brian Griffiths giving Bolton fans the sticks...but it's time to LET LATICS GEL'

Caddy from the 5:

Week 5,048 and we’re all still writing, ‘This will be the week’ that the EFL finally seal the deal to bring in Senor Moreno and hopefully end what simply is a charade now. Every week is Groundhog Day. I’m gonna assume the takeover gets done (eventually) and the Spaniards come in, this week I’ve heard a journalist who follows Leganes (can’t remember his name sorry) speak very highly of Felipe Moreno and his footballing nous. But more importantly, in my eyes, we’ve heard from Graham Hunter on these pages. Now what this man doesn’t know about Spanish football isn’t worth knowing, and he says it’ll be a good fit for both parties.

Reading what snippets we’re being told it seems they (the Spanish) will come and run a VERY tight ship, as they do at Leganes, there’ll be no Dave Whelan-esque cheques written to get us back to the Prem ASAP (and remember Whelan was pumping £1 million a month to keep us a afloat before he sold) it seems they’ll work on loan deals, the academy and spending little money. Am I bothered? Not in the slightest...

Six months ago we didn’t even know if we’d have a Wigan Athletic to watch again, and like it or not, we’re not a money making club and have basically nothing left to sell, thanks to Gerald Krasner and co, so we’re hardly a marquee club to buy, I’ve no idea if Mr Moreno is here for the long term or not, but if he comes in and steadies the ship, brings us back with a fighting chance of not just staying up this season but being competitive in this division next season, so be it. None of us know what the future is - but at least we’ll have one.

I’ve watched Latics since the early 80s and seen some awful times, awful teams and awful owners, but I (and thousands of others) stuck by us, dreaming that one day we’d actually get somewhere and do something, get the Prem for eight years, win a major cup and Europe? Nah, we never thought we’d see that! But just some bits of success would do, and thanks to Whelan we achieved everything and now is the time to stand by the club more than ever. Now I get that a lot of our fans aren’t old enough to remember collecting for Stan McEwan’s wages in buckets during a game, watching Bobby Campbell hit the bar v Leeds in the quarter final of the cup or see Brian Griffiths give Bolton fans the sticks at Burnden (what a night), they’re used to seeing Wigan Athletic in our glory years. Whether we like it or not, FOR NOW, those days are well behind us, and seasons of lower league football now look like it’ll be the norm.

So what lads, you’ve gotta take the rough with the smooth, for every Wembley there’s Wimbledon, for every Maribor there’s Mansfield. Our ‘Premier League hangers-on fans’ are all back supporting whoever they were before us, good riddance. Our backs are to the walls again now and it’s time to bounce back again lads/lasses and let’s all get behind whoever takes over, whoever’s playing for us and whatever division we’re in and show em, just LET LATICS GEL! Now let’s all raise a 'Bow, or 16, to our new Wigan Athletic FC. Happy Christmas to all the Tics fans out there and surely a better New Year. It couldn’t be any worse...

Statto

Any day now could be the day we find out if the Spanish bid is accepted. All I’ve read from official sources gives me reason to be optimistic of a stable settled club, may not reach the heights of the Premier League but all I want is to watch my team week in, week out when Covid-19 allows. To the flip side of this there are people on social media, claiming to be in the know, saying the Spanish bid is all wrong for the club - but showing no evidence of it hiding behind legal reasons they say. Now if other bids/bidders were that good, sorry you missed the boat – stop bleating, we have been this way since July, why did you not step in then?

On the pitch two wins on the spin a mad game against Accrington, shows what we are up against dominant first half but they make three subs with first team experience wouldn’t say changed the game as such we conceded sloppy goals but nevertheless it’s something we can’t do. Rochdale? The least said the better, from the first minute to the 95th we never got near them or the ball. Whether it was just a bad day, wrong formation, we put it behind us and move on. Stay Safe

Matthew Auffrey

After months of nail-biting, name-calling, rumour-sorting, and webpage-refreshing, we are finally on the verge of a monumental decision for Wigan Athletic. When the Spanish bid was accepted in late September, it felt appropriate for celebrations to commence. We gathered the ingredients to our paella, started the fitting process for our sombreros, and when faced with the choice of stocking our refrigerators with San Miguel or Estrella Damm beer, decided to clear space for both. As Latics fought to establish their footing on the pitch during the month of October, many of us fans were content with putting our feet up and enjoying some tapas while we waited for an EFL decision.

That honeymoon period was short lived and as Wigan Athletic fell further down the league table, exited multiple cup competitions, and saw key senior players depart the club or miss significant time with injuries, the joy of celebration quickly was supplanted by the angst of desperation. When the EFL’s spell of silence had all but suffocated our dreams, the players threw us a lifeline by going to the Stadium of Light and earning a courageous victory against a strong Sunderland side. Several days later, the EFL stifled the festivities of our three-point-party by rejecting the Spanish takeover until further amendments could be made to the ownership plan. The short-handed Latics responded to that news by generating their finest half of football yet this season and took a 3-0 lead into the halftime break against early League One promotion contenders, Accrington Stanley.

Clouds filled with adversity formed over the DW Stadium just before the hour mark of last Saturday’s match, and as it rained over Latics it served as another reminder that anything good that has happened to Latics during administration will quickly be followed by a setback of some proportion. Yet, the lads were stronger than the forces working against them and came out victorious over Accrington, prevailing in a seven-goal thriller. However, as we returned to the DW Stadium this past Tuesday for an early season six-pointer against Rochdale, those same dark clouds that plagued us three days earlier still lingered. Even the most pessimistic of Latics fans would not have put us down for a 5-0 defeat that day, but because Rochdale were every bit as clinical as we were substandard, such a result came to being.

Without nit picking at every single detail that contributed to Tuesday’s drubbing, the recurring theme persists that reinforcements are not a want but rather a major need for this club as we enter 2021. If and when our new owners are officially approved for takeover, us fans will rejoice with them. However, we will not celebrate to the point where we blackout and forget about the grim position we were put in because of our preceding owners. The continuous uphill road we face will not plateau for a long while.

We need to hire a first team manager who will not only inspire our players to League One survival, but offer the tactical creativity to elevate the club up the league table in the coming years with consistent positive results on the pitch. We need to find new players who will not only provide a talent upgrade but will buy into the manager’s philosophy and are willing to fight at all costs to ensure our safety this season. Our academy needs to remain our shining star and be the ace-in-the-hole that can not only churn out bodies to supplement the first team, but also help generate the player sales that will keep our club financially sustainable for years to come. Ultimately, we need owners who will remain committed to our club – come good times or bad – no matter what looms on the horizon in the footballing world.

Sean Livesey:

Is this it? Is the nightmare going to come to an end? In this horrific years of years will Wigan Athletic supporters be bestowed with an early Christmas present? As always over the last 11 weeks – who knows? It’s now over two weeks since Jose Miguel Garrido Cristo was disqualified by the EFL and in that time Felipe Moreno of Leganes has emerged as the sole investor behind the revamped takeover bid. A revamped takeover bid that at the time of writing hasn’t been signed off by the EFL but it feels like it’s now only a matter of time until it is. We’ve heard this week from a number of Spanish journalists including Graham Hunter, seen as the most authoritative voice on Spanish football. He and many others spoke very well about the man from Andalusia. Leganes have been a club transformed under his leadership along with that of his wife (president of Leganes) Victoria Pavon. The club from the outskirts of Madrid rose through the divisions in Spain under their leadership and became a force to be reckoned with in Spain. Only falling out of La Liga last season.

On the face of it if Moreno is passed (or rather the whole bid ratified as Moreno has already passed the owners and directors test failed by Garrido Cristo) it represents a very good deal for Wigan Athletic. But as always the devil will be in the detail. There has been rumour abound surrounding the plans for the club, from running it with minimal investment to potentially closing the academy. None of this has actually been confirmed as fact, and the only public declaration on the deal comes from the man who has now been disqualified and is to have no part in the running of the club. If we do take what Garrido Cristo said as gospel it would mean aiming to run Wigan Athletic on a sustainable footing again, whilst aiming to invest in improving the academy. If Felipe Moreno is of that opinion too and that actually plays out then I think most Wigan Athletic fans would be confident for better days ahead. Equally I understand why so many people are apprehensive over the takeover.

We’ve been stung badly over the last six months. Lives and livelihoods teared apart on a whim by two people on the other side of the world who had never even stepped foot in Wigan.

Those issues have been exacerbated by a horrific six months spent in administration, a period that I maintain has been far more damaging than it needed to be. Constant missteps and miscommunication have led to a distrust of any sort of process and the eleven and a bit weeks that the Spanish takeover has rumbled on for hasn’t helped matters at all. But without firm evidence to the contrary we have to take our prospective owners at their word and hope this time we have found custodians who will care for Wigan Athletic like we do. There’s a lot of rebuilding to do at Wigan Athletic and it’s going to take investors aware of that to turn this ship around.

On the pitch we had a typically rollercoaster week, a nerve shredding win over in-form Accrington followed by a humbling pasting at the hands of Rochdale. I think that Rochdale defeat really drove home our situation, the last time we played Rochdale was in early spring of 2018. We’d just reached the FA Cup quarter-finals, were flying on our way back to the Championship and it felt like we were on top of the world. Tuesday’s defeat was the complete opposite. A lot of people speak about the disconnect between themselves and Latics, sadly that’s just going to continue until we’re back in grounds and judging by today’s announcement it could well be next season before we’re back in any sort of number. Amazingly we’re still in touch with the lower reaches of the division and if and it’s a BIG IF Felipe Moreno can look to invest in a few players to support our amazing young lads we may just be able to celebrate at the start of next season in League One. Time will tell.

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