Wigan Athletic were undone by an appalling decision from the match officials for the second game in a week.
Last week Jermaine Defoe`s opening goal for Spurs was allowed to stand even though he was clearly in an off-side position this week a theatrical dive by Birmingham player Keith Fahey was rewarded with a penalty rather than a booking by novice referee Anthony Taylor.
In a game that the Latics were desperate to get something from they started slowly but withstood early pressure from Birmingham and restricted the home side to just a couple of half chances one of which saw defender Scott Dann crash an effort against the Latics cross bar from a Larsson free kick.
Roberto Martinez` men had some pressure of their own without really creating anything then as the game was drifting into first half stoppage time Fahey did his impression of a flying fish on the edge of Latics penalty area following a look at him from Mario Melchiot and the Latics found themselves 1-0 down after James McFadden slammed the resultant spot kick home.
Martinez made two positive substitutions at half time to try and redeem the game taking off the totally out of sorts Paul Scharner and replacing him with Jason Scotland and also Charles N`Zogbia was replaced by Victor Moses
The two changes sparked the Latics into action and they were by far the more adventurous side in the second half and created the best chances which unfortunately they couldn`t convert, Hugo Rodallega saw an excellent effort miraculously saved at point blank range by Birmingham keeper Joe Hart and he also fired agonisingly wide from 12 yards.
Birmingham were fortunate to finish the game with eleven men when Liam Ridgewell took a two-footed lunge at James McCarthy and not only cleaned out the Latics youngster but also the assistant referee who had to be carried off the pitch following stoppage lasting 6 minutes, again referee Anthony Taylor showed his in experience by not even cautioning the brutal Ridgewell.
So a disappointing end for the Latics but the second half display showed a lot of heart, once again though poor decisions by match officials have cost Wigan Athletic dearly
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Unlucky and should have at least a point from the game
Still our fault as much as the refs.
Some truly baffling decisions this month. Does McCarthy have to end up like poor Ramsey before someone cards these people scything him down??? Full lunge two footers, three in a week: Bale, Huddlestone, Ridgewell. NOTHING.
Defoe on Caldwell…THROW IN!
We don’t crowd the refs or throw hissy fits which I like, but if you get continually punished for following the rules, what’s the reward in playing fairly?
Doesn’t help that our best three divers, Heskey, Zaki, Palacios are all absent. We need to start flopping around more I suppose.
Gomez is one of our better divers.
A shocking decision has cost the club their survival potentially. I still think things will get better but there’s no doubt that a lot of very harsh things have been instilled upon the club in recent weeks.
never mind using the decison as a smokescreen for our truly awful, passionless and disjointed performance. Captian Mario’s lunge at a ball which was going away from goal presented Brum with an opportunity they should not have had. A player of his experience should not be making schoolboy errors like that and sums up our whole season
I didnt think we were passionless at all
I think the phrase “passionless” is a smokescreen for people taking digs at the team.