Wigan Fans Support Their Local Team... Kind Of

The other day I commented on the tedious “I support my local team” chant, after watching a Spurs vs Wigan game. Logic told me the chant must have been coming from the Wigan fans, although I imagine all people in the ground that day were local to their respective clubs.

Regardless, when we took on Wigan last night, I was expected more of the same. These small time clubs having a pop, as if none of us in Old Trafford are Manchester lads.

However, the Wigan fans didn’t have the nerve to sing such a chant to us!

With the players lined up on the pitch it’s clear to see just how few Wigan fans showed up last night. Granted it was a midweek game but christ, we’re only half an hour down the road! The away end restrictions were smaller than usual anyway, with the stewards sitting closer to the South Stand than usual, yet there were still masses of empty seats.

“We love you Wigan, we do!” and “come on Wigan!” was about as creative as their chants got.

This is of course in contrast to the team, who played arguably the best football we’ve seen at Old Trafford this season. Whilst Hull scored plenty of goals, Wigan’s passing and movement were spot on, no longer a side we could trounce 4-0 when in the mood.

Palacios, Valencia, Melchiot and Zaki all looked pretty handy and as a team they were certainly not afraid to pass the ball about. Lovely one-touch passing at times and bags of potential. Frustratingly for them though, they lacked end product, shooting wildly off target on numerous occasions. But at least they were shooting, something the second placed team in the league couldn’t claim to have done three days earlier!

Hats off to Bruce though, he’s done a great job there. They’re currently 7th in the league, 4 points behind Everton and just 7 points behind Arsenal. It is a massive achievement and I’d love too see a good finish to the season for them.

Had Wigan scored in the second half we couldn’t have begrudged it. United surrendered position far too easily, with Wigan winning most of the 50/50s and for their effort they will have felt hard done by leaving with nothing.

A bit of a come down after our scintillating display against Chelsea but at the moment I’m far more concerned about the three points than I am the performance. We can wait until we’re top of the league before we start getting picky!