Wigan Athletic - Securing Survival

[JCMUtdfan1]

Hi everyone,

I've always seemed to have a soft spot for Wigan when I first saw them play in the Premier League and hearing about their journey from League 2 to arguably the best league in the world. But after an impressive first season which saw them sit in second place in November as well as reaching the League Cup final, they have been struggling to stay in the Premier League. This is what prompted my story idea as I thought it would be good if I could secure Wigan in the Premier League and put an end to those 'great escapes', no matter how exciting they may be. Eventually the ideal would be to get Wigan challenging for European football and then challenging for the title etc, but I don't know if I'm a good enough player to be able to do that so I'm just going to see how it goes. If anyone is interested in following this then that would be great and the first update will be up soon which will have Pre-season and August in it. Hope you enjoy the story

*EDIT*
Just so you know in case you think that the story will be five seasons of just escaping the relegation zone, I've had more success than I thought I would. I won't be specific as it would give it away but I thought the title may give the wrong impression to some people.

[JCMUtdfan1]

Martinez Resigns!

The much loved Wigan manager has resigned from his post this afternoon, declaring that he wants to spend more time with his family in Spain. The Wigan fans are upset but can understand the manager's decision, and he will always be loved for the 'great escapes' he led Wigan to over the seasons. Questions will now be asked as to who will take over as Wigan manager, and whether they can secure Wigan's survival in the Premier League or whether it will be a continuation of the season long battle against relegation. Paul Jewell is linked with coming back to the club he managed as well as names like Steve Kean and Mark Hughes. Dave Whelan and his team are expected to name their new manager by the end of next week.

[JCMUtdfan1]

Wigan Hire Conroy

After taking a sabbatical from football, Jordan Conroy has taken a leap back into management with Wigan Athletic. The appointment comes as a bit of shock after Conroy's stints at high profile clubs such as Manchester United, Inter Milan and Bayern Munich; winning multiple league titles and European cups. The Wigan fans are ecstatic about the appointment, wondering if this spells the end of the months of nail-biting as they try to avoid relegation. In an interview Jordan said "The short term aim for the club is to secure it's status in the Premier League without having to perform miracles at the end of every season. Once survival has been consolidated the long term aim is to push for European competitions and even the title if we become good enough". People scoffed at the long term aims, thinking that he must be mad to think he can get Wigan Athletic into Europe. The fans are also skeptical about this but aren't going to complain if it happens. The season starts next month and we will see if Conroy can work his magic on Wigan Athletic.

[JCMUtdfan1]

Pre-Season

I wanted to try and get my transfers done as early as possible, though with the limited transfer budget I needed to sell a few players before I could bring in the players I wanted. I signed Wellington Nem as everyone else has done on this game and I was surprised he wanted to come to Wigan. Another surprise transfer was Anderson from Man United, when I saw he was available I thought I'd try and snap him up and I was able to do so. I also brought a couple of people in on loan to cover positions and I managed to get Royson Drenthe on a free which I thought was pretty good.



Pre-Season Games

21/7/12 A
Wigan Athletic 5 vs. 0 Welling
Di Santo(8) Kone(14,53) OG(45) McArthur(64)

24/7/12 A
Wigan Athletic 4 vs. 0 Aldershot
Di Santo(25,74) Kone(29) Jones(84)

28/7/12 A
Wigan Athletic 4 vs. 3 Portland
Beausejour(8) Kone(22, 86) Caldwell(27)

2/8/12 A
Wigan Athletic 2 vs. 0 DC United
Di Santo(5) Caldwell(77)

4/8/12 A
Wigan Athletic 1 vs. 0 Philadelphia
Di Santo(48)

11/8/12 A
Wigan Athletic 1 vs. 0 Chivas USA
Boyce(82)

*Ramis injured 5 weeks*


August

Not the easiest start to a Premier League season by any stretch of the imagination but I thought we did pretty well. Playing out a thrilling 3-3 against Arsenal and going 2-0 up at the home of the champions was pretty impressive. I wasn't expecting to get at the end of those two games so I'm thrilled I managed to get a point out of them. Also a routine win in the Capital One Cup saw us out the end of the month.

Premier League
18/8/12 H
Wigan Athletic 3 vs. 3 Arsenal
Kone(7, 82) Di Santo(35)
Arteta(4) Giroud(9) Podolski(31)

Really pleased and surprised we managed to earn a point out of this game as we worked hard from the start.

25/8/12 A
Wigan Athletic 2 vs. 3 Man City
Caldwell(12) Di Santo(22)
Tevez(38, 43) Kolarov(61)

*Kone injured 4 weeks*

I thought another upset was on the cards as we went 2-0 up but it wasn't to be as City managed to fight back, what a scalp that would have been early on.

Capital One Cup
28/8/12 H
Wigan Athletic 3 vs. 1 Nottingham Forest
Di Santo(3) Wellington Nem(14) Miyachi(56)
Crusat(37)

A nice easy game to finish the month with compared to the first two though one of our departures hit back at me by scoring.

[JCMUtdfan1]

September

A slightly easier month though it was interrupted by the incredibly annoying international break. The late winner at the start of the month helped us along as the first win is always important. We seem to be scoring well so far but that went out the window in the Capital One Cup 4th Round where we had about 3 easy chances to score which we somehow managed to miss before getting hit on the break. We made up for it by spanking Reading 5-1 at the end of the month to improve our goal difference.

Premier League
1/9/12 H
Wigan Athletic 3 vs. 2 Stoke City
Ninkovic(37) Boyce(54) Kone s/o(70) Di Santo(90)
Crouch(16) Jones(62)

Great to win the game in the last minute like that, nice to get the first win on the board as well.

15/9/12 A
Wigan Athletic 1 vs. 1 West Ham
Di Santo(57)
Carroll( 6) Nolan s/o(31)

Bit disappointed we didn't win this one as they had a man disadvantage for most of the game.

Capital One Cup 3rd Round
25/9/12 A
Wigan Athletic 0 vs. 1 West Brom
Dorrans(69)

*Ramis injured 3 weeks*

We should have won this game easily but we just couldn't finish our chances and paid the price.

Premier League
29/9/12 H
Wigan Athletic 5 vs. 1 Reading
Kone(22,35) Drenthe(24,32) Caldwell(40)
Roberts(49)

This made up for not being able to score last game but annoyed we couldn't get the clean sheet we should have had.

[JCMUtdfan1]

October

Another interesting month with a couple of shock results thrown in. We start the month with the 2-2 draw against Chelsea as we seem almost unbeatable at home before doing to West Brom what we should have done last month as well as picking up our first competitive clean sheet. We lost the plot against Sunderland before smashing Liverpool 3-1 at Anfield to finish the month!

Premier League
8/10/12 H
Wigan Athletic 2 vs. 2 Chelsea
Alcaraz(10) Kone(77)
Ben Arfa(31) OG(82)

*Anderson injured 4 weeks*

A game where we were unlucky to draw really as it was only an own goal that got them the point as at that time they never looked like scoring

20/10/12 H
Wigan Athletic 3 vs. 0 West Brom
Kone(15) Di Santo(43) Wellington Nem(78)

A great game where we dominated throughout, we seem to be doing better than I thought this season...

27/10/12 A
Wigan Athletic 1 vs. 3 Sunderland
Kone(26)
Brown(36) Sessegnon(41) McClean(89)

*Ramis injured 4 weeks*

With their position in the league we should be doing better than that thought the 3-1 score does flatter them.

31/10/12 A
Wigan Athletic 3 vs. 1 Liverpool
Kone(36) Watson(82) Ninkovic(85)
Cole(73)

On Halloween it was Liverpool who went away with a fright as they went to pieces in the last 10 minutes which we took full advantage of.

[StorytellerSam]

Good story man! I'll follow check out my Wigan story, "Room for potential" - The Wigan Athletic Story

[JCMUtdfan1]

November

A pretty tough month where we had our first home league defeat and the first game where we were completely outclassed. The two came at the start of the month where Tottenham battered us 4-0 before losing 3-2 to Man United at home. We then dropped more points against Southampton before winning against Norwich and QPR. We seem to be going well in the league, well above the relegation zone and I hope we can continue that later on in the season.

*2/11/12 - Brendan Rodgers sacked as Liverpool manager*

Premier League
3/11/12 A
Wigan Athletic 0 vs. 4 Tottenham
Sosa(9) Huddleston(40) Adebayor(45+1, 64)

Disappointed in this game as we never looked like scoring.

10/11/12 H
Wigan Athletic 2 vs. 3 Man United
Kone(27, 84) Figueroa s/o(88)
Rooney(4,22) Evra(83)

This game wasn't as close as it looked though we had a chance to nick a draw right at the end.

17/11/12 A
Wigan Athletic 1 vs. 1 Southampton
Kone(19)
Lambert(66)

Another lackluster performance away from home but at least we picked up a point.

*22/11/12 - Stuart Pearce hired as Liverpool manager*

24/11/12 A
Wigan Athletic 4 vs. 1 Norwich
Anderson(12) Di Santo(64,70,89 pen)
Morison s/o(40) Bennett(73)

This is more like it, a convincing performance as well as our first hat-trick of the season.

28/11/12 H
Wigan Athletic 2 vs. 1 QPR
Kone(8,21)
Cisse(27)

A narrow win where nothing much seemed to happen past the 30 minute mark.

[JCMUtdfan1]

December

Injuries are starting to set in this month which is terrible news as we don't have a very deep squad. Three injuries in one game was taking the piss a bit though we still managed to hold City to a 0-0 even with playing most of the second half with 10 men because of the injuries. The wins are becoming less frequent though we have had a tough run of fixtures which isn't likely to improve over January, I'm just hoping we'll be able to pick up enough points to keep ourselves in the top half of the table.

Premier League
1/12/12 A
Wigan Athletic 2 vs. 1 Swansea
Watson(3) Di Santo(24)
Shechter(10)

*Watson injured for 5 months*

A solid win away from home which we hadn't been doing earlier on this season but Watson being injured for so long is annoying.

8/12/12 H
Wigan Athletic 1 vs. 1 Everton
Drenthe(74)
Jelavic(49)

*8/12/12 - Martin Jol sacked as Fulham manager*

A game which we should be winning considering Everton's position in the table but it took a free-kick from Drenthe to earn a point.

15/12/12 H
Wigan Athletic 0 vs. 0 Newcastle

A boring game where neither side created many chances, a win would have been nice though.

*21/12/12 - Ian Holloway hired as Fulham manager*

22/12/12 A
Wigan Athletic 3 vs. 1 Fulham
Wellington Nem(12) Di Santo(13) Kone(70)
OG(17)

Our away form seems to be better than our home form at the minute which is a complete turn around from the start of the season where I couldn't buy a win away from home.

26/12/12 A
Wigan Athletic 2 vs. 3 Aston Villa
OG(17) Di Santo(72)
Benteke(10) Bent(35) Westwood(50)

We never seemed to get going in this game enough to win but we managed to pick up a couple of goals like we seem to do at home.

29/12/12 H
Wigan Athletic 0 vs. 0 Man City

*Kone injured for 7 weeks*
*Caldwell injured 1 week*
*Anderson injured 6 weeks*

This game really annoyed me in terms of injuries as three of my key players have been injured, and two for an extended period. On the other hand I was happy with the way we defended, even though City were wasteful.


Sorry but I forgot to take a screenshot of the league table this month, though I think we were still in 9th

[JCMUtdfan1]

Good story man! I'll follow check out my Wigan story, "Room for potential" - The Wigan Athletic Story

Thanks mate and will do