This is Wigan, we do things differently here …

It’s been a while hasn’t it?

At the time of writing 25 days to be precise, the first winter World Cup has provided a relief of sorts but nothing to ever replace the domestic football that it so foolishly replaced thanks to Fifa’s grubby decision making over a decade ago.

With the bottom two divisions of the EFL carrying on, alongside the second round of the FA Cup it’s been a very un-even bit of down time for English football and one I hope we never have to repeat, as exciting as the football has been in Qatar it’s come at a huge cost both human and reputational.

Anyway back to Latics and it’s been a very quiet three weeks in Wigan town as the club look to build on that win over Blackpool before the break. Well that’s probably how it would have gone in an alternative reality but not for us, as Anthony H Wilson once said “We do things differently here”.

So it’s with a genuine bit of excitement and some trepidation that we look ahead to the trip to Bermondsey on Saturday afternoon and the first match in charge for Kolo Toure. It’s been good to see Kolo on the training pitch in recent days first of in the training camp in Turkey and now back at Cristopher Park.

Somebody commented earlier this week that Toure is probably the biggest name we’ve ever attracted to Wigan either as a player or manager and I think that’s a fair assessment. Toure is indeed a huge name and it represents a complete sea change for Wigan Athletic and a big departure from Leam Richardson, who was anything but a big name (comparatively speaking) but had fostered a fantastic team spirit at the club.

Perhaps that big departure from what went before was required, Talal spoke earlier this week about the need to transform the club both on and off the pitch.

In fairness to Phoenix 21 we’re well on our way to doing that off the pitch and many believed that we were on the pitch, sadly that wasn’t to be the case but if the arrival of Kolo Toure and his backroom staff can help that transformation on the pitch we’ll be all the better for it.

From the photos we’ve seen and the warm words we’ve read Kolo certainly looks raring to go, I know little about his character other than what his team mates and former managers have said to the press. What comes across is a warm and pleasant individual, but also a winner and someone who has always strived to do better.

In this afternoon’s press conference to announce his arrival as Wigan manager Kolo spoke about finishing his career as a player and knowing he didn’t have a divine right to become a manager. So he spent five years working alongside Brendan Rodgers, first during the highly successful spell with Celtic and latterly at Leicester City where European qualification and an FA Cup win followed.

Someone who has been willing to get that sort of experience should be applauded, we may not have been the club Toure envisaged but we’re definitely a decent place to start a career. Perhaps we’re doing ourselves a disservice there of course. We spent ten years in the Premier League, won an FA Cup, played in Europe and launched the careers of household names across the Premier League. Maybe we’re exactly the sort of club that someone like Kolo Toure would be attracted to.

Either way the time for talking will soon be over, it’ll now be time to see how Toure can transmit his ideas on to the pitch. It’s not going to be easy and fans shouldn’t expect some magic wand that will solve all of our issues.

Leam Richardson achieved miracles last season and for the early part of our season it looked as though we would stay up comfortably but football is a fickle game and within five weeks we had gone from play off contenders to relegation threatened and Leam had lost his job.

There’s no guarantee that Kolo will be able to turn this ship around quickly and we as supporters can’t expect miracles. If we can keep in touch with the sides above us over the Christmas period, see progression towards a more possession based ‘positive football’ if you will and manage to strengthen in the New Year we should be well placed for a strong second half of the campaign.

Kolo’s ready. Are we? Bring it on.

Sean Livesey

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