Wigan Athletic: The 12th Man - ‘Another handful of wins should see us safe'

RedNed:

A hard fought three points at Shrewsbury last week, underlines the current status and experience of the squad.

We've had a bit of an up and down season with inconsistency a theme throughout. It is only to be expected with a young squad, quite a few of whom are undertaking their maiden season in regular first team football.

It will be interesting to see what Summer brings in terms of player recruitment, there's a bit of comment online that we need to see major investment to mount a promotion challenge. Personally I don't think that will be the case. The emphasis will more likely be on more youth development aligned to a policy of sensible spend when and where it's needed.

It would be good though to hear the owners long term plans for the club, whatever they look like. The majority of supporters just want to know what the ambitions for the club look like and put the last few years of unpredictability behind us.

Hopefully we can pick up at least four points from the next two home games against Cheltenham and that lot from Horwich, mid-table mediocrity will do us nicely for this season.

Sean Livesey:

Has anybody got any fingernails left after Saturday?

Talk about nervy endings to a match.

Saturday was a really important result, for one Shrewsbury are close to us in the table and secondly it was a return to winning ways after two disappointing defeats against both Exeter and Oxford.

Latics looked in control against Shrewsbury without ever looking like we would run away with it, indeed Thelo Aasgaard could have made things a lot more comfortable if he had made a better connection with the chance he had towards the end of the match.

Instead we had the ridiculous situation of the team having to see out eleven minutes of injury time. Where the referee had got eleven minutes of injury time from is anyone's guess.

When the previous two games had seen ridiculous amounts of time wasting that had only garnered a total of three minutes injury time.

All you ask for from officials is consistency, but anyone who's watched Wigan Athletic in League One this season will know that consistency is the last thing we've had from referees this season.

So we've hit the 40 point mark and February isn't even finished yet. We're not quite there in terms of League One survival but we're not far away.

Another handful of wins should see us safe, let's hope we can get one of those on Friday.

I'm looking forward to another match under the lights on Friday.

We've barely had a Saturday match at home this year and when we have it feels like we've not done as well as in the night matches so we may as well embrace it.

Get behind the lads on Friday if you can.

Tony Moon:

It ain’t whatcha do, it’s the way that you do it. But that ain’t always true, me and you, we both knew it. Sat’day, it were tight, wi backs to t’ wall but Shrewsbury blew it. Cos that’s what gets results. It ain’t whatcha do it’s the time that you do it, Eleven minutes extra time had stomachs turn to suet. But belief and great team spirit helped the Latics to get through it. And that’s what gets results. You can whinge hard. Don’t mean a thing. Take it easy. Enjoy a mid table fling! It ain’t whatcha do, it’s the way that you pass it. Sometimes it doesn’t work and with a young team that’s just tacit. Some games you have to be prepared to just go out and smash it. Cos that’s what gets results.

Matt Auffrey:

There was no shortage of nervy moments during last weekend’s trip to Shrewsbury, but we still managed to leave the Croud Meadow as 1-0 victors. Shrewsbury surely considered themselves unfortunate not to take more from the match. However, the result seemed fitting for us after we had suffered consecutive defeats to Exeter and Oxford despite the match stats (particularly the ‘expected goals’ stat) indicating that we deserved at least a point from both affairs. Nonetheless, the result only further emphasised how ridiculous life in the league mid-table can be. Our results don’t often match our performances, but the wins and losses still balance each other out over time.

The resilient effort last Saturday was every bit inspiring as it was reassuring. Accumulating 40 points on the season now puts us within striking distance of the ‘magic’ of the 50-point mark - which represents the highest point total that a team has ever accrued while still being relegated from League One over the past 10 seasons. Surpassing that point total ourselves should all but guarantee our status in this division for next season. It’s quite possible that we break 50 points in the month of March, and a victory over Cheltenham on Friday could certainly serve as a springboard towards achieving that goal. The Robins have won three on the bounce and will likely have some extra pep in their step at the DW knowing that a win could possibly take them out of the relegation zone by full time.

Yet, Latics will have just as much to play for in front of their home fans. With a familiar foe from Horwich visiting the DW on Tuesday, it would be a huge boost to go into the derby off the back of a victory four days prior. Maloney will be on the touchline again after serving his yellow card suspension and should be eager to get our home form back on track. Friday will mark exactly one month since we last won at the DW when we beat Wycombe by a 1-0 scoreline. The lads proved at Shrewsbury that they have what it takes to dig deep and grind out a victory against a physical opponent. Let’s keep our foot on the pedal over these next few games and see where the Believe Bus takes us. If we can get our point total closer to the teams in the play-off places, in place of our current proximity to the teams at the bottom of the table, we could stir up quite a bit of excitement over the final few weeks of the season. We have a lot of work to do before we get to that position. Let’s beat Cheltenham first!

Ed Bazeley:

Wigan Athletic's home and away form seem to have switched roles in recent weeks with Latics picking up two wins in three away games, but losing two consecutive home games.

With a big week ahead at the DW for Latics with the visit of a resurgent Cheltenham Town and then the derby match with Bolton Wanderers on Tuesday, it's time to turn that home form back around and reinstall fortress DW.

Some major positives have happened at the club over the last few days with Jason Kerr impressing during his appearance as Latics defeated Shrewsbury Town on Saturday, while promising youngster Baba Adeeko extended his contract at Wigan. This shows that Shaun Maloney's young crop of players really believe in his methods, and I am excited to see how well we could do next season without a transfer embargo and without an eight point deduction.

Perhaps a play-off push is on the cards next season, but for now let's just continue picking up the points to maintain our comfortable mid table status.

Charlie Keegan:

Last week, I mentioned that I missed the ‘boring’ 1-0 victories after we experienced 19 goals within our last 4 League One games. Well, we finally got to see another 1-0 victory as we went to Croud Meadow to see Matt Smith’s volley secure us another three points over Shrewsbury Town. However, I wouldn’t say it was boring…

The first half was certainly one where both sides were trying to settle into the game slowly, with neither side willing to overcommit in case a quick counterattack was launched on them. I did not mind this approach, and I am sure Shaun Maloney was happy with what he saw from the terraces. Shrewsbury are a side scrapping for some kind of strong rhythm to see them secure safety over the coming months, so the importance of an early second-half goal from Latics to knock the home side was always going to be needed.

I liked the step-up in intensity that Latics started the half with, and it was clear that the game started to liven up as the referee handed out six yellow cards within the first 20 minutes. This game told me that we have started to learn from our mistakes throughout the season of starting the halves with a muted mentality. I did not doubt that we would regularly see Latics be slow off the mark at times, as like we have all been mentioning time after time, this is a group of young players with many in their first senior season, but now Latics are proving that they can navigate through tough games and reap the rewards.

Latics have now played 10 teams twice, where we have won 10, drawn 3, and lost just 7. Only Stevenage have beaten us twice, and we have picked up the full six points against Play-Off chasing Peterborough United, and bottom-half scrappers Shrewsbury Town. 33/60 points won against these 10 sides. Again, this is the kind of big-picture analysis that shows just how brilliant our season has been, all things considered.

Prior to hosting Cheltenham Town at the DW, Latics sit on 40 points with 13 games to go. 50 points is often the target to secure safety in the division, however, I do think the threshold will be a little lower this season given the struggles of the lower-down sides. With this target in mind, Maloney just needs to guide us to 10 more points from a possible 39.

Darrell Clarke has revitalised Cheltenham Town, taking them from being winless - and goalless - in their first 10 games of the season, to being one point away from escaping the drop-zone whilst having two games in hand. It isn’t often that managers outside of the top six get nominated Manager of the Year, but Darrell Clarke has to be on that list. As does Ruben Selles. As does Shaun Maloney. Surely?

The DW lights on Friday night will hopefully present us with an exciting, and battling game, with both sides desperate to inch closer to safety. Oh, how I would love to see us get another 1-0 victory. Up the Tics.