Wigan Athletic vs AFC Bournemouth – Match Preview

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Well the TNS office after a hectic start to the week; had a more relaxing remainder to the week.

We’ve assessed the ‘Comings’ and ‘Goings’ with the January Window. We’d hoped Dave had been to B&Q for some WD40 for the doors at Wigan Athletic, with the fact we saw over 15 Transfers & Loans in January.

Incomings saw Chris Herd 8, Billy Mckay 10, Sheyi Ojo 18, Gaetan Bong 20, Leon Clarke 21, Liam Ridgewell 27 & Jason Pearce 28 all join the team.

Outgoings saw Ramis – Levante, Watson – Watford, Maloney – Chicago Fire, McManaman – WBA, Forshaw – Middlesbrough, Riera – Deportivo La Coruna, Tavernier – Bristol City, Fyvie – (Hibernian) Contract Cancelled & Delort – Tours, all leave the DW Stadium. Of course some of these departures were expected; some surprising and some meant we only have 1 player left from the FA Cup Final in 2013. (Answers on a Postcard)

The assessment of the TNS office is one of mixed, the players leaving and those coming in do have a ‘No Nonsense’ style, flair seems to have left, not that I can remember any in the last few months. Best word to describe the Darkside of the Office is ‘Meh’, a new word I had to look up in Steve’s Dictionary, I know ‘Old School’, but the Wolf did teach me something new this week.

Basically, it’s “I have so much Apathy for the club at the moment, even the transfer dealings can’t stoke any passion!”

Must admit I’m happy with the youthfulness of some of the players and curious if ‘The Bong’ is going to be another Cult ‘Chimbonda’ Figure? Let’s see?

It’s the 29th game in the Sky Bet Championship. Wigan Athletic will be playing AFC Bournemouth at the DW Stadium, match will be played on Saturday the 7th February & kick off will be 3pm.

Oh that reminds me, its 3 weeks to my 45th Birthday, hint to Steve to get me a TNS Birthday Cake for the office, assume Moonay will bring his own Spoon?

League Position for Wigan is the same as it has been for a number of weeks, even though they picked up a point away to Ipswich last weekend, yes they’re still in 23rd place.

AFC Bournemouth is you’ve guessed it, Top of the Championship with 54 pts; they are top on goal difference from Derby. So you can see this looks like it could be a one sided affair!

Looking at recent form coming into this game, as expected Wigan are still low in the Form table, in fact they’re 19th with 5 points from their last 6 games. Bournemouth (you don’t mind if I drop the ‘AFC’), are in 4th place with 12 points from their respective 6 games:

  • Wigan P 6 W 1 D 2 L 3 (Win against Leeds and Draws against Blackburn & Ipswich)
  • AFC Bournemouth P 6 W 4 D 0 L 2 (Wins against Fulham, Millwall, Rotherham & Watford)

Previous Games between the 2, we covered in depth in the corresponding fixture earlier in the season, that game saw Bournemouth beat Wigan 2-0, at a time when Uwe Rosler was fighting for his future & we know what happened to him. Anyway overall the game meant there had been 41 games between the 2, with Wigan winning 16, Bournemouth 15 and with 10 draws, thanks to Cockney Latic for the head to head info.

Referee from the Game will be Mark Haywood, trundling down their respective lines will be Paul Kettlewell & Nigel Smith. The 4th Official will be Sebastian Stockbridge.

Mark, recently took charge of a Wigan game, December’s game against Watford, saw Watford win 2-1 with a goal in the 82nd minute. Mark dished out 3 yellow cards in that game, including one for West Brom’s McManaman, do you see what I’ve done there.

For Bournemouth, Mark took charge of the game in October, which saw them beat Reading 3-0, with Pitman getting a couple, the ref on this occasion didn’t have to reach in his pocket for any cards.

Team News, well to start with Wigan has today confirmed the signing of Kim Bo-kyung who had been released by Cardiff. Other than that they could have anything up to 6 new players in the 11 for Saturday, though after a strong defensive performance against Ipswich, I can’t really see Malky making wholesale changes to the team for this match against Bournemouth.

Team News for Bournemouth (via the BBC), they will be without midfielder Eunan O’Kane who suffered a ligament strain against Watford last Friday.  Midfielder Dan Gosling (ankle) is already sidelined, while defender Baily Cargill (hip) is also out.

Well looking at the Bookies they can only see the 1 winner, they are running at 51% believing it’ll be an Away win, 25% believe it’ll be a draw and the remaining 24% see Wigan winning at Home for the first time since August.

Looking at William Hill too, we have some interesting odds, 18/1 for a 2-0 win for Wigan, you can get 3/1 for Wigan just to win the match at Home, Bournemouth are 21/20 to win Away. My favourite is 90/1 for Billy Mckay to score first and Wigan take all 3 points with a 2-0 win. Remember you heard it here first.

My thoughts on the game, well I’m positive after a decent transfer Window removed those bad Chemical odours. A cracking defensive display against Ipswich last weekend, I believe Malky can build on this and play Counter attacking football down the Wings, get a couple of goals and start the slow march up to the promised land of 21st place.

Andy

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