Walsall 2 - 0 Wigan Athletic

2nd September 2000

  1.     Walsall    P5 W5 D0 L0    Pts15

  2.     Bury    P5 W3 D1 L1    Pts 10

  3.     Wycombe    P5 W2 D3 L0    Pts9

Walsall won their fifth game out of five this season with a solid win against last years playoff losers, who frankly did not look like threatening WFC's lead at all.

Walsall started off brilliantly having several chances in the first five minutes, Leitao and Angell the strike force were having no trouble finding their way through a woeful Wigan defense. After 9 minutes Brett Angell slotted a diagonal ball through for Jorge Leitao who calmly poked the ball over the advancing Wigan Goal keeper.

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Leitao curls the ball round and over the advancing keeper (right) and team mates congratulate him on the goal!

1-0

less than 6 minutes had gone when another useful WFC attack put Wigan 2-0 and contemplated a big defeat. Brett Angell was again involved when his cross-shot went across the goal mouth and the smallest man on the field, Dean Keates (my MoM) was in the right place at the right time, to slide the ball into the net; WFC were cruising, but as we are beginning to learn the best way to beat Walsall is to let them go 1 or 2-0 up. Of course with 16 minutes gone and WFC 2-0 up, they had obviously won the game; a big mistake, Graydon's side decided (as they have done on many unsuccessful occasions before) to relax and invite the Lancashire side to attack. Although Wigan did not manage to score past WFC today, it would be a different story in the first division as we found out many times last season. Against a good striking partnership WFC would probably have been lucky to get one point out of the match. I wonder if you remember Crewe at home last season, went 1-0 up through M. Robins, lost 4-1; Bolton Wanderers away, went 2-1 up, lost 4-3; Charlton Athletic, we went 1-0 up through Rambo lost 4-2, and that is just a few of the examples that came to mind. So we need to stop relaxing and inviting teams to attack, which, if we get promoted will prove fatal!

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Darren Wrack Congratulates Dean Keates on scoring the second goal

In the second half WFC showed a bit more composure and started to look the better team, although they did not extend their lead, they maybe should have but with Referee Furnandiz having a terrible game (3/10) getting through an increasingly frustrated and dirty Wigan defense was proving difficult, Wigan did manage to hit the post from Lidells shot, but that is about as close as they came!

If this was supposed to be the best that Division 2 could throw at WFC, well i'd like to see the worst.

 

Will it be 6/6, next match Bury Away 9/9/00

WFC