English Premier League – Match Review: Wigan Athletic versus Stoke City
The match started off with a bang for the visitors as it was Stoke City who pushed hard early on. Tony Pulis’s men maintained a monopoly over ball possession in the opening ten minutes as they played their usual long ball football
towards the likes of Ricardo Fuller and Kenwyne Jones. Jones was pivotal for the visitors as he held the ball up throughout the first half of the match. In the 10th minute of the first half, Stoke City built up their first meaning full attack of
the ball.
Robert Huth, Stoke’s right back was heavily involved in the build up play as he played in a remarkably timed ball towards Ricardo Fuller. The robust striker controlled the ball with ease as he found himself in space inside the
Wigan penalty area. However, due to some extraordinary goalkeeping by Ali Al-Habsi, Wigan remained on level terms with the visitors.
Stoke soon made the home side play for slack defending as they were awarded a free kick in the 17th minute of the match near the Wigan penalty area. Robert Huth was in action yet again as Stoke went for power rather
than accuracy. Nonetheless, Huth got a lucky deflection off Thomas in the Wigan wall as the ball deceived Al-Habsi and ended up in the back of the net for Tony Pulis’s team. It was a lucky goal for Stoke City, but it gave them a well-deserved lead, as they
were clearly the better team during the first 20 minutes of the match.
In the 25th minute, Wigan almost drew level with a deflected free kick of their own; Ben Watson was the man who took the free kick for the Latics as his strike took a deflection off Steve Gohouri. Regardless, quite fortunately
for Stoke, the ball was deflected away from the goal, as Asmir Begovic looked totally beaten by the flight of the free kick. Against the run of play in the 29th minute of the match, Wigan got their equalizer as Watson tried his luck on goal for
the home side, but his shot fell to Antolin Alcaraz who finished effectively bringing the score line to 1-1.
In a remarkable period of 60 seconds, Stoke immediately hit back with a goal in the 30th minute of the match; Jones played in strike partner Fuller inside the Wigan penalty area. Fuller pulled the ball back for Matthew
Etherington, who was unmarked on the far post for Stoke City. The Englishman made no mistake as he slotted the ball home to put his team in front yet again. Right before the half time break, Wigan started to get into their tempo and rhythm as in the 37th minute,
Charles N’Zogbia found himself at the end of a saved shot by Begovic, the Stoke goalkeeper palmed the ball straight to the ex-Newcastle man who played in Hendry Thomas. Astonishingly, Thomas managed to side foot the ball wide of the goal despite being just
five yards off the goal line.
However, Wigan did draw level in the 40th minute, as this time N’Zogbia played in cleverly. The young English national cut inside Huth and unleashed a powerful shot from around twenty yards out, but his drive took a
deflection off Danny Higginbotham before ending up in the back of the Stoke City net. Thus, the first half ended with the score line at 2-2.
In the second half both teams tried to do their best to get the lead, but their efforts were in vain, as both the defences stepped up to the mark to keep second half clean sheets. Wigan were the brighter of the two sides in general
during the second period of the match, but Stoke were no slouches as well as they gave it their all to obtain all three points on their travels. However, in the end, the match ended at 2-2 as there were no goals in the second half.
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