Harbinger Of Glory

Ok, this is getting weird. How the hell have Wigan equalised? I literally just stood up to get food and came back to 2-2. What is happening?

I’ve been watching the game, and this Wigan team does something to my blood pressure every single week.

They were 2 goals down for stretches of the game, and now they’re the ones pushing for a winner. What are they eating?

Thought this was finally the game where reality showed up. Reality apparently hasn’t got the address for the DW.

The momentum shift after that equaliser is genuinely one of the most dramatic things I’ve watched this season.

Other supporters whose teams had played against Wigan, still carrying their own memories of Wigan’s wins against them, came into the thread with an ”I told you so” energy.

We told you. We specifically told you. You don’t get comfortable against this team.

Fulham fans two weeks ago: surely they’ll drop points soon. Wolves fans right now: surely they’ll drop points soon.

Someone tell me how a newly promoted side has this much character. I need to understand it so I can tell my side, Manchester United, to start acting this way too.

This and a lot more was the consensus after Wigan’s winner.

Back at the DW, the home crowd was doing everything it could.

They sang, they cheered, they jeered the Wolverhampton players and made it clear that they understood the next few minutes were going to decide something, and every Wigan touch was met with a swell of noise that pushed into the players’ backs like a physical thing.

”It has been all Wigan since that equaliser,” the commentator said on the broadcast.

”Everything. The ball, the chances, the momentum. Wolves are pinned, and at the moment, they do not have a response.”

”It makes you wonder how they were two-nil down at half-time,” the co-commentator said.

”It’s like an entirely different team but with the same players?”

The main commentator laughed.

”Maybe they needed the challenge.”

”Maybe they did,” the co-commentator responded.

On the pitch, Seriki, who had come on for Tiehi, took the ball and laid it off to Leo, who’d been subjected to some very brutal skinship.

At this point, he was more familiar with seeing the grass than his own teammates.

Every inch he got on the ball, he was sent tumbling to the ground, so much so that the Wolverhampton team had gotten 2 additional yellow cards, with Bellegarde even almost getting a second after he decided to foul another time.

He nudged it forward as the DW chants rose with each step he took, the crowd willing something to happen through the sheer volume of wanting it.

He found Reyes, who received the ball on the half-turn and immediately drove at Wolves’ midfield.

”Reyes carrying it forward...” the commentator followed, only for Lemina to step in at the right moment.

The challenge was clean, sending the ball spilling loosely towards Pablo Sarabia, who’d replaced Bellegarde.

For a split second it looked as though Wolves had finally won themselves a way out, but just as Sarabia took hold of the ball, he spun to find Leo bearing down on him.

But he wasn’t alone.

Tiehi and then Reyes, who’d lost the ball a moment ago, boxed him in.

The three blue shirts swarmed the loose ball before Sarabia could react, and suddenly Wolves were retreating once more, barely having had time to lift their heads.

”Straight back to Wigan,” the commentator said. ”Wolves just cannot get out.”

Leo, after sweeping the ball from underneath Sarabia, looked up only briefly.

He knew he wanted the ball to go to and without waiting too much, he went through with it.

With the outside of his right boot, he wrapped his foot around the ball, sending it curling away from the nearest defender before it bent back toward the left channel.

Carlo never had to slow down.

He met it in stride and without taking a touch, he whipped a first-time delivery into the middle.

”Excellent ball now... Who’s in?”

Jake attacked it, climbing above Dawson and catching the cross cleanly with his forehead.

The connection was solid, but his direction wasn’t.

The header sailed a yard over the crossbar before dropping onto the roof of the net right as a collective groan escaped the DW, and then it was followed almost immediately by applause.

The chance had gone, but the pressure was still on.

”That was a very close shave. One minute to ninety,” the commentator said. ”And Wigan still looking for the winner.”

Wolves finally managed to slow the game down after the change of possession.

They kept the ball moving across their back line, working it from one defender to the next with no interest in attacking, only in taking the sting out of Wigan’s momentum.

Every pass drew another blue shirt forward, and every touch invited another press.

The home side chased relentlessly, but Wolves refused to panic, patiently moving the ball until the space they wanted finally appeared.

When it did, it was José Sá who spotted it first.

His clearance sailed high towards Pedro Neto on the left and the Portuguese burst after it, shoulder to shoulder with O’Shea as both men raced towards the bouncing ball.

The winger tried to edge in front, but O’Shea refused to give him the angle.

The pair arrived almost together, and at the last moment, the Wigan defender launched himself into a sliding challenge, stretching every inch of his frame to reach it.

His boot hooked the ball away before carrying through into Neto’s legs, sending both players tumbling across the turf as the ball spun harmlessly past the touchline.

Neto got up very angrily, calling for a foul, but the referee had seen what unfolded and determined that O’Shea had gotten just enough of the ball to deem it not a foul.

”Excellent defending from O’Shea!” the commentator called. ”He had to get that right, and he did.”