The way things are shaping up Newcastle United will be involved in most of the remaining Premier League issues, but they made an unexpectedly generous contribution to Wigan's survival chances here at the expense of their own hopes of a top-four finish.
No one takes Wigan lightly any more since their heroics against Arsenal and Manchester United, yet few could have expected quite such a landslide. When the first goal went in it was the first Newcastle had conceded in 411 minutes of football, which is an indication of how consistently well they have been playing. When Wigan took just two minutes to score another one, then sent their fans into rapture by adding two more before the interval, it was tempting to wonder which was the team fourth from top and which was the one fourth from bottom. It was only the fourth home win of the season at the DW, and certainly the first time they have scored four there.
"Wigan were brilliant today, as good a team as we have played in the last seven games," Alan Pardew said. "We couldn't match their intensity and in the first half especially that just made us look bad."
Roberto Martínez was not about to disagree. "I am extremely pleased, as you can imagine," the Wigan manager said. "We showed a real clinical touch today that we haven't always had in the past. We are winning games now that we would previously have drawn."
Wigan have undoubtedly saved their best until last, with Martínez only appearing to hit on the right formation and the most effective players to use when relegation seemed a certainty. Victor Moses, Franco di Santo and the vastly underrated Shaun Maloney justified their manager's decision to leave Hugo Rodallega on the bench, though it was Wigan's use of wing-backs that caused Newcastle most problems.
The first two goals both came from the flanks, with Maloney hitting a glorious crossfield ball to Emmerson Boyce for the opener, with Moses flicking a header over Tim Krul from the left-footed cross. Moses has never scored twice in the same game for Wigan before, but within two minutes he had put that right as he took advantage of Fabricio Coloccini's mistake when attempting to cut out Jean Beausejour's searching ball in from the left.
Beausejour and Boyce were hardly performing any defensive duties and finding acres of space on the wings to attack, so, belatedly, Alan Pardew attempted to change Newcastle's shape to replicate Wigan's, with Davide Santon moving across to the right and Jonás Gutiérrez given the run of the left flank. It didn't work, and Newcastle switched back again for the second half after shipping two more goals.
Beausejour and Di Santo effortlessly passed Danny Simpson out of the game to put Maloney clean through, an opportunity the midfielder coolly accepted by drawing Krul and slipping the ball past him from a narrow angle. Then on the stroke of the interval Di Santo tried his luck with a shot from 25 yards and the ball fairly arrowed into Krul's top‑right corner.
If Wigan were having the sort of day when everything went right, Newcastle were clearly having the opposite. It took 40 minutes for Demba Ba to register their first serious attempt on goal, and that was after a defensive mix-up by the home side. It would not be wholly correct to say everything Wigan attempted came off, for some of their passing and decision-taking, especially in dangerous areas of defence, was ludicrously casual for a team in their position.
Papisse Cissé brought an excellent save from Ali al-Habsi just after an hour, then hit the bar with another good effort two minutes later, before a glorious run from Hatem Ben Arfa brought the first moment of real alarm in the Wigan defence.
Ben Arfa also went close from the subsequent corner, showing superb close control before putting a shot the wrong side of a post. Suddenly the second half was becoming as one-sided as the first, without Newcastle being able to find Wigan's goal touch. Another dazzling piece of skill by Ben Arfa on the left led to a cross from which Cissé flashed a header against a post.
With a little more luck, or perhaps accuracy, Newcastle could easily have had two or three goals and been back in the game, yet Pardew seemed to signal surrender when he withdrew Ben Arfa for the last quarter of an hour and sent on Ryan Taylor in his place. The visiting goal threat duly subsided, and the rest of the game passed without incident, Wigan practising their passing and only getting the one chance to go further ahead, when Coloccini was obliged to clear off the line from Conor Sammon after Mike Williamson made a mistake to let the substitute in.
Wigan are not safe yet, but they have given themselves a wonderful chance of survival. With only the bottom two teams left to play, and one of those already relegated, they will only have themselves to blame if they mess it up from here. "I expect there will still be a lot of surprises," Martínez said. "We need to get as many points as we can because I don't think 37 is going to be enough."
szólj hozzá: Wigan Newcastle 1:0 Moses
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