English FA Premiership/ Wigan Athletic 4 Manchester City 3: Wigan continued their hot pursuit of a place in Europe in an extraordinary game that saw them fall behind after two minutes, surge back into a 4-1 lead and then almost surrender it again as Manchester City managed an improbable rally with two late goals.
It was a performance that left Wigan's manager Paul Jewell understandably flustered. "You can't take your foot off the gas at this level because you can get punished and we almost did today," he said. ". . . we've got to be a bit more professional at 4-1, I think. If we have to make a game ugly we should do it. We should have made the win more comfortable."
City were arriving on the back of an impressive 4-1 win over Birmingham and their manager Stuart Pearce had kept faith with the man of that match Antoine Sibierski, despite having Andy Cole back from suspension. That decision was justified by the visitors' first attack, David Sommeil swinging in a hopeful ball from the right which found the tall Frenchman unmarked for a sharp downward header past Mike Pollitt in the Wigan goal.
Wigan have not risen to sixth in the table on luck alone, though, and they dug in. Initially they were flummoxed by City's 4-3-3 formation which had Sibierski and Trevor Sinclair dropping into the midfield when Wigan attacked, leaving the home side's moves floundering in a thicket of yellow-shirted players.
But Wigan quickly adjusted, bypassing the midfield with long, raking balls to their pacy front two Jason Roberts and Henri Camara and the more direct approach quickly paid off.
In the 11th minute Pollitt rolled the ball out to Jimmy Bullard whose long pass from the right saw Roberts break free of the defence, then coolly slot the ball in off the inside of the post.
In the 24th minute Wigan were ahead. Camara tormented the hapless Sylvain Distin to distraction on the right, then slipped a pass to Gary Teale whose wicked cross was headed firmly into the top corner by Lee McCulloch.
By half-time it was three, Ben Thatcher's back-header putting Roberts away, the striker holding off the challenge of Distin to drag David James wide in order to roll the ball into the far corner. Tactics had gone out of the window - "all hell broke loose", said Jewell - with the players chasing the ball like kids in a schoolground. Midway through the second half Wigan struck again, Camara nutmegging substitute Richard Dunne to score easily.
At that point it seemed as if Wigan would get a hatful. For a team without stars they do not lack self-belief. The home fans were singing "What's it like to be outclassed?" whereupon the visitors pulled a goal back, the excellent Joey Barton volleying in a careless Matt Jackson header.
Still the excitement continued and Cole, on as a substitute, seized on a half-chance two minutes from time to leave the home support on tenterhooks.
"For a defender of 25 years, watching us defend was a horror show," said Pearce. "We created our own problems and if you defend like that over 90 minutes you don't deserve to win games."
Wigan, having come through a run of five straight defeats in what Jewell described as the "fixtures from hell", now have back-to-back league wins and an encouraging festive programme to follow against West Ham United, Blackburn Rovers and Birmingham City. Not bad for what their chairman Dave Whelan described as a team of "pie-eaters".
* Guardian Service
