Yes and no.
On the yes side, It's pretty much meaningless in terms of promotion and definitely meaningless in terms of relegation.
Like art and music (and anything else that isn't eating, drinking and making a shelter) football is basically pointless all of the time. Just cos you build a giant story of meaning around something and give it a theme tune and a trophy and billions of pounds of prize money doesn't mean it has any more point to it than an informal kick about on the park.
It's all just an effort to pass the time in between doing the things we actually have to do.
Football is football is football and Wigan is always personal for me as this is where I grew up and my relationship with the 'Tics' is resentful, immature and bitter. Ideally today we'll hit double figures before halftime and then accelerate after the break and before the game is over, Ryan Lowe will send a ballboy on with a little white flag and then the Wigan chairman will come down on the pitch and deliver their resignation from the league such is the shame they feel at their total and utter shellacking at the hands of the one true force in the football world and we'll all go off into the post industrial sunlight and back down the road to Wigan Pier with a spring in our step and a song in our heart...
___
Anyway...
My abiding impression of the goal was they had it on their left and without any particular effort put the ball in the goal because people, including Harry Tyrer weren't where would be ideal to stop the ball going in. It seemed like the kind of thing that would have happened to me in my spell as goalkeeper for my school team, Tyrer realising what was happening about the same time I stopped thinking about McLean, piss and mortality and being only able to collapse backward and spoon the ball upwards into the net.
It's funny - because it doesn't really matter, there isn't the outpouring of ire that tends to follow a bad moment in a game that does. Last year, the Wigan game really did matter (ultimately, it was one of those games that had we won, we'd have got into the play offs) and the atmosphere was tense and pretty testy. It felt like everyone was too on edge to get behind us. Here, we absorb the goal and carry on. The news that Preston concede gives everyone a lift. Charlie Patino is hailed because let's be fair, it's a great song.
The first half is pretty poor. Offiah looks good and Apter keeps trying to do things, but the left hand side is non existent. Super Jimbo isn't having a vintage afternoon and CJ is a ghost. In the middle, we're outnumbered and Evans is pointing and jogging about as if he's aware of some other midfield players no one else can see who he thinks will get the ball for him. We're disjointed and over reliant on a booming kick from back to front where neither Fletcher nor Ennis are getting much out of the Wigan centre backs.
We do make a decent chance and to be fair to CJ,, who has an otherwise poor half, it's him who creates it. We've miss someone to drive with the ball all half and the one really good moment comes from CJ picking it up, running about 20 yards and slipping a very good pass into Niall Ennis who draws the keeper and unfortunately hits his legs. Wigan have some chances, we have some corners and the half seems to both pass quite quickly but not be a noticeably great game either. Perhaps time moves at different speeds in different places. Maybe it's just me - maybe we perceive time differently in different places.
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Half time is grim muttering about 'the usual feast of football' and wondering why Tom Bloxham never starts when the evidence gained before he got injured was that he's pretty good. Such is the level of languid relaxation about today that I don't realise the half has started and am surprised to see football happening when I return to my place.
Are we any better? Initially, no, but gradually yes. We make the change we want to see with Bloxham coming on, although CJ going to left back isn't necessarily anyone's prime choice for how you fit him in. It does work though and CJ does ok - the rejigging seems to help us pin back Wigan's wide players more effectively and therefore gain a bit more control of the game, whereas in the first half we seemed to chase shadows in the middle and them just pop it wide with impunity. We don't make a stack of chances, but we at least move it round with a bit more purpose and whilst anything we do create seems to end in a ballooning header or a tame shot on the stretch, Wigan are creating very little and seem to be getting deeper and deeper as per the received wisdom about Ryan Lowe's unadventurous approach.
The goal when it comes isn't spectacular. CJ makes a good run from deep, Morgan spots him and slides the perfect ball inside the full back and CJ bursts past him, gets tangled up with his desperate lunge and goes down. It looks very much like a penalty and a penalty it is. There's a moment of alarm in the stands as CJ picks the ball up and walks to the spot, people literally turn to each other in shock. CJ? Taking the penalty? - Lee Evans though strides over with authority and the tangerine massive relaxes. He's not had a good game, but the lad can smash a penalty. Smash it he does. It's a great penalty high into the left hand corner and giving Wigan's otherwise very assured looking goalkeeper absolutely no chance at all.
Preston concede again. Much joy. I particularly enjoy us blatantly stealing Wigan's Bob Marley chant, cos it's great.
From here on in, it's all 'Pool. Again, it's not that we force heroics from the Wigan defence, but it's definitely us on top and playing the best football we've played today (and last week for that matter) as we pen Wigan back, move it quickly and confidently and carve out a few decent chances. Ennis snatches at a near post chance and hits the side netting. It felt as if he might have had time for a more composed effort.
There's a penalty shout as Onomah and Ennis combine and the latter might have been clipped as he looked to burst through, Morgan has dig from distance that he doesn't quite catch and right at the end, Evans lifts a curling ball, Ennis takes a step and then acrobatically flings himself into the overhead kick. For a split second it seems like a fairytale end but the ball runs across the face of goal instead of over the line and that is that.
---
I think on balance we were the better side but that said, we were poor in the first half. It was a decent day out with a football match to go with it. It didn't answer any questions about next season. I was a bit disturbed that Onomah looked quite effective when he came on on the basis that I don't want us to be seduced again by a player who has all the attributes you'd want (that's me being seduced isn't it?) but who, in the cold light of day, offers you about 600 minutes a season and only 100 of them at full tilt.
The goal when it comes isn't spectacular. CJ makes a good run from deep, Morgan spots him and slides the perfect ball inside the full back and CJ bursts past him, gets tangled up with his desperate lunge and goes down. It looks very much like a penalty and a penalty it is. There's a moment of alarm in the stands as CJ picks the ball up and walks to the spot, people literally turn to each other in shock. CJ? Taking the penalty? - Lee Evans though strides over with authority and the tangerine massive relaxes. He's not had a good game, but the lad can smash a penalty. Smash it he does. It's a great penalty high into the left hand corner and giving Wigan's otherwise very assured looking goalkeeper absolutely no chance at all.
From here on in, it's all 'Pool. Again, it's not that we force heroics from the Wigan defence, but it's definitely us on top and playing the best football we've played today (and last week for that matter) as we pen Wigan back, move it quickly and confidently and carve out a few decent chances. Ennis snatches at a near post chance and hits the side netting. It felt as if he might have had time for a more composed effort.
There's a penalty shout as Onomah and Ennis combine and the latter might have been clipped as he looked to burst through, Morgan has dig from distance that he doesn't quite catch and right at the end, Evans lifts a curling ball, Ennis takes a step and then acrobatically flings himself into the overhead kick. For a split second it seems like a fairytale end but the ball runs across the face of goal instead of over the line and that is that.
---
I think on balance we were the better side but that said, we were poor in the first half. It was a decent day out with a football match to go with it. It didn't answer any questions about next season. I was a bit disturbed that Onomah looked quite effective when he came on on the basis that I don't want us to be seduced again by a player who has all the attributes you'd want (that's me being seduced isn't it?) but who, in the cold light of day, offers you about 600 minutes a season and only 100 of them at full tilt.
We definitely missed the energy of the left sided players who are out initially and another 45 minutes of being overrun in midfield and second to the loose ball wasn't great - but equally, today was yet another game when the tweaks Bruce made to the side during the game were effective and he reworked the thin resources at his disposal into something that was quite effective towards the end of the game.
Afterwards, the glow of the pre-match beers wearing off, I sit on the train home and I think of how going back to Wigan is always a little bit like coming home for me and I think about how much has changed since it was my home. Springfield Park long gone, the town centre hollowed out like everywhere else, the pub I used to drink in all boarded up, my primary school demolished, friends dispersed all over the world now, some of them beyond this world...
On reflection, I'm glad Wgan didn't have to resign out of shame, as playing them is a reason to go back and waste a bit more time there.
As we reach Preston, the calm of the carriage I'm in is disturbed by the intercom announcing, "Ladies and Gentleman, our next stop is Preston, if you're leaving the train here...(etc)" which is underscored by the noise of "Preston get battered" being broadcast to all the coaches - I smile to myself.
It's been a decent day out all in all.
Onward
It's been a decent day out all in all.
Onward
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