Wigan Athletic will be taking on Premier League new boys in the first game of the season for the second time in a row tomorrow. Obviously all the home faithful will be anxious to avoid a repeat of the result this time last year, and in all honesty it is more than likely that the Canaries will be returning to Norfolk without any points.
On the whole Latics tend to give newly promoted teams a lesson when it comes to meeting them early in the season, Sunderland and Hull City being prime examples.However, Latics have never beaten Norwich City in any league game, that said the clubs have only met in league competition on two occasions, so for Latics it may well be a case of ‘third time lucky’. There have been fan reports from Christopher Park of James McCarthy and Antolin Alcaraznot taking part in training. although Roman Golobart, who would be a natural replacement for Alcaraz is looking very sharp indeed.
Canaries manager Paul Lambert is expected to field new signings Steve Morison from Millwall and James Vaughan who has been snapped up from Everton. Grant Holt will also be in the front line and he along with the rest of the Norwich City stalwarts, who have had two successive promotions to reach the promised land, will be eager to test their mettle against a top flight team, who they will feel are beatable.
History of this fixture,
31/01/1987 – FA Cup, 4 – (H) – 1-0 – (Paul Jewell) – 8.095
Tunks, Hamilton, Knowles, Cook, Cribley, Holden, Lowe, Thompson, Campbell, Jewell, Hilditch
(Future Latics striker Wayne Biggins played for City, as did future two times Latics manager Steve Bruce)
16/09/1998 – League Cup, 2.1 – (A) – 0-1 – 11,426
Carroll, Green, Bradshaw, Griffiths, McGibbon, Rogers, Lee, Greenall, Lowe, Martinez, Barlow, (Warne 85)
22/09/1998 – League Cup, 2.2 – (H) – 2-3 – (Gareth Griffiths, Stuart Barlow) – 3,,402
Carroll, Green, Jenkinson, (Smeets 71), Griffiths, Balmer, Rogers, Lee, Greenall, Lowe, O’Neill, Barlow
04/10/2003 – Division One – (H) – 1-1 – (Andy Liddell) – 9,346 Filan, Eaden, Jackson, Breckin, McMillan, Liddell, Dinning, (Jarrett 68), Bullard, Kennedy, (Teale 73), Ellington, Horsfield
09/04/2004 – Division One – (A) – 0-2 – 23,446 Filan, Eaden, Breckin, De Vos, Baines, Liddell, (McCulloch 70), Bullard, Jarrett, (Farrelly 75), Mahon, (Teale 59), Ellington, Roberts J
(Future Latic Damien Francis played for Norwich)
01/08/2009 – Pre Season Friendly – (A) – 2-3 – (Charles N’Zogbia, Won-Hee Cho) – n/a
Pollitt, Melchiot, (Boyce 46), Bramble, Scharner, Figueroa, (Edman 46), N’Zogbia, (Cho 46), Cattermole, (Bouaouzan 46), Watson,(Brown 46), Thomas, (Gomez 46), Koumas, (De Ridder 46), Rodallega, (
Scotland 46)
Wigan Athletic/Norwich City links,
John Benson, Keith Bertschin, Wayne Biggins, Mark Bowen, Carl Bradshaw, Ged Brannan, Drewe Broughton, Steve Bruce, Paul Cook, Paul Dalglish, Neil Davids, John Deehan, David Fairclough, Damien Francis, Bryan Hamilton (man), Matt Jackson, Jason Jarrett, Rob Newman, Kevin Reeves, Bruce Rioch, Antoine Sibierski, Peter Thorne, Steve Walsh, Dave Watson, David Wright
Other Wigan/Norwich City links,
John Gallagher, Joe Clare, George Cooke, James Dickinson and John Houghton played for Norwich City and Wigan Borough.
Some squad member are pictured in training ar Christopher Park yesterday in the accompanying photograph.
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