City took on top of the league Wigan Athletic yesterday at Sincil Bank, hoping to edge closer to League One safety. Michael Appleton made two changes to the side that drew with Fleetwood. Cullen and Bishop came in for Hopper and Marquis.
We started with a 4-3-3 formation with Bishop the furthest forward out of the three. Cullen played through the middle, while Scully and Maguire played on the wings. I think they were two changes we expected, especially considering their impact off the bench against Fleetwood. Much of the pre-match talk was around Liam Bridcutt being injured again. It’s frustrating but MA hasn’t ruled out a contract extension, which will anger part of our fanbase. You can’t argue that Bridcutt has a massive influence both on and off the pitch, but we need someone who can play in his role when he is injured. Jorge Grant did it really well last year, and Max Sanders was brought in to play second fiddle to Bridcutt, but he has been ignored for massive parts of the season. It will certaintly be interesting to see what our retained list looks like and if we keep players such as Marquis and Bridcutt.
I thought we started quite strongly. The first chance of the game went our way. Lewis Fiorini dribbled through the Wigan defence for his effort to take a deflection and go slightly wide. Despite that early chance, we found ourselves conceding first. Wigan took the lead through Lang after a knockdown from Magennis. Our centre-halfs will certaintly be disappointed with the goal, especially Jackson losing the battle in the air with Magennis, which made it simple for Lang to finish past Wright.
We have spoken so many times this season about letting our heads drop when we concede and we certaintly didn’t do that with the first goal. Just six minutes later we were on level terms, thanks to Anthony Scully. Cullen started the move with a run down the right and a ball into Bishop, Fiorini had the ball on the edge and his shot deflected perfectly to Anthony Scully, who after taking a touch, tapped home.
I think we all went into the game thinking we’d be defensively solid. We had our three best out and out defenders (in my opinion), in Walsh, Poole and Jackson on the pitch, and our more defensive left-back in Jamie Robson. Despite having them as a back four, I thought we looked weak, but Walsh and Jackson are still getting back to their best after a stop start season. I also remeber thinking that Robson needs a pre-season with us. He needs time to get stronger for the league, a bit like Jorge Grant did.
Not long after, we were losing again. Scully gave the ball away in an attacking position, and they get back in front, thanks to some good fortune and poor defending. Just before the goal, I did start to think we had a chance in the game, and even when we conceded, I thought we might nick a point but some poor defending and the officials cost us.
I will speak about the officials as it is something that needs to be covered. I came out of the ground angered about it, claiming ‘they ruined the game’ I still feel somewhat that way because the third goal shouldn’t have stood and at that point it becomes a completely different game, but we didn’t get robbed as Wigan are a good side and played well enough to beat us. To be honest I feel the incident with Ted Bishop in the box was a penalty to us. MA described it as a rugby tackle and the replays show it wasn’t as bad as it seemed, but for me it is a penalty, especially as it was given as a goalkick meaning the Wigan player didn’t touch it. The third goal shouldn’t have stood as I said earlier. I would normally look at both sides of the story for this but the Wigan player has pulled down our player with his shirt, which is foul, end of story. It’s been taught at primary school level. A shirt-tug is a foul, and how the referee hasn’t called it, is just beyond me if I’m honest.
If luck goes our way, we get a penalty at 2-1 down, and it could have been a totally different result. If we did manage a point, it would be labelled a good performance rather than saying we were poor. We looked bad defensively but everything else we did well I thought.
I’ve seen Maguire being targeted post match, he hasn’t had the best season by any stretch of the imagination, but there was a point where he was our only bright spark in the team. I feel his attitude is getting him more criticism than he deserves at the moment.
We have a job to do in the summer. MA knows it and there is players that know they might not be here next season. It will certainly be an interesting end to a difficult campaign and hopefully we can secure safety on Friday or against Cheltenham on Monday.
AllLincoln MOTM is Lewis Fiorini