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COYLE NAMED BOSS

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Owen Coyle has been appointed as the new manager of Wigan Athletic. The president of the club, Dave Whelan, announced Coyle’s signing on Friday.

Coyle has replaced Roberto Martinez who left the Latics earlier this month to join Everton.

Coyle had been without a job since the last 7 months. He had started the last season as the manager of Bolton Wanderers, but, because of the dreadful performance of the Trotters at the start of the season, he got sacked in October last year.

Announcing the appointment of Coyle, Whelan said, “Getting back to the Premier League is our first priority next season and I have made Owen aware of that.”

“This is not a new scenario for Owen. He has done it before when he was the manager of Burnley.”

“Yes, he didn’t have that much success at Bolton, but, there were quite a few reasons behind that. He had to deal with several injuries there and he was also unlucky at times.”

Coyle himself was also present in the press conference. He said, “We ended the last season on a high by winning the FA Cup, but, it was not a successful season overall. We lost our Premier League status and that was a big blow.”

“The target is to make our way back into the league. It will not be easy, but, we will put in hard work and try our best to do that.”

The Wigan players also seem to be quite happy with Coyle’s appointment. The Latics midfielder James McArthur wrote on his twitter account “Glad to hear that Owen Coyle has taken over as the manager of Wigan Athletic, another manager from Scotland. I am looking forward to play under him.”

Wigan Athletic will start their Championship campaign next season against Barnsley on 3rd of August.

DI SANTO MATURES

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The Wigan manager Roberto Martinez has said that he believes that the striker Franco di Santo has finally matured as a footballer. The Argentine arrived in English football as an 18-year-old striker and Chelsea had paid around £ 3.5 million to secure his services many years ago. However, he never managed to establish himself at Stamford Bridge. This led to a succession of loan spells at different clubs including Blackburn Rovers, but he finally managed to secure a permanent move to Wigan recently. The £ 2 million move to Wigan just under three years ago has transformed the player according to the Wigan manager.

The 23-year-old has come a long way since being a reserve team player at Stamford Bridge, as he recently made his debut for the Argentine national team. Many were surprised when Martinez claimed more than a year ago that di Santo is capable of playing for Argentina. However, the manager is not surprised that he made such a comment because he knew that di Santo will come of age eventually. Martinez feels that the striker has definitely learnt that he had to get out of Chelsea in order to progress in his career. The regular game time at the DW stadium has been one of the main reasons for this development according to Martinez.

“He’s two different players. The one he was at Chelsea, a young man full of dreams. Now he is a man living his dream. When he arrived at Chelsea, he was a young man with the world at his feet and he had to grow up quickly. In football, you need to play games to do that. I think Franco’s experience at Chelsea has made him the man he is now. Now he’s a completely different footballer, after the experiences he had with Blackburn and ourselves,” said Martinez.

NO LUCK FROM REFS

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The Wigan athletic manager Roberto Martinez is of the opinion that smaller clubs do not get the benefit of the doubt when playing against the big teams. Wigan were recently left frustrated after the 1-0 defeat at the hands of Arsenal. During the match, the manager Roberto Martinez felt that a number of decisions went against his team after they crashed to yet another defeat in the league. The 1-0 defeat now means that Wigan have slipped into the relegation zone after taking just one point in the last five matches. Pressure is high on the manager Martinez to deliver the results.

He is confident that he can turn around the situation, but has said that he could do nothing about the refereeing decisions that are always biased towards bigger clubs. Arsenal were awarded a penalty in the second half after Theo Walcott went down rather too easily in the match. Mikel Arteta converted the spot kick that give Arsenal all three points, but Wigan could have easily avoided defeat in the match had it not been for such refereeing decisions. Martinez has also said that Wigan were unlucky not to be awarded as well, which only has compounded the situation.

“We’ve been at the end of bad decisions. That happens. You need to get through it, you can’t moan about it and we need to start picking points up and make sure we affect it as much as we can. I wouldn’t like to be a referee, it’s the worst job on the pitch. You’ll always upset someone. When you have to make a 50-50 decision, it’s a lot easier to be safe on teams like ourselves. I’m not saying [just] Wigan, but when you are a bottom 10 team it’s not a problem when you get it wrong,” said Martinez.

NOT SELLING

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The Wigan athletic manager Roberto Martinez has said that he is extremely confident that the club will not be forced into selling the star assets like Franco di Santo, who is out of contract in the summer. The former Chelsea striker joined the club for a relatively low transfer fee, but he has improved hugely under the guidance of the manager Roberto Martinez. This has even led to the call-up to the Argentine national team in the recent friendly match against Saudi Arabia. As a result, he has been linked with many big clubs in Europe.

Martinez, though, has said that he hopes that the striker signs new contract with Wigan and does not get carried away with all the hype surrounding the international call-up. Martinez has also revealed that he has spoken with the player about the possibility of signing a new contract. He is also confident that the club will be able to refrain from selling him during the January transfer window. There is a suggestion that Wigan will be tempted into selling him rather than lose him for nothing in the January window. The club has already lost the services of the Nigerian winger Victor Moses during the summer. Moses was extremely crucial in getting them out of relegation trouble last season.

“It’s not going to be a financial decision. I can guarantee that we’re not going to try and cash in early. We showed last season that if we feel a player can give us something we’ll keep him, even if he can walk on a free. To replace a player who can score 10 or 15 goals in the Premier League you’ve got to talk about £10million, so if you haven’t got that sort of figure it would be foolish for us just to try and get a bit of money,” said Martinez.

MARTINEZ DELIGHTED

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The Wigan athletic manager Roberto Martinez has said that he is extremely delighted with the performance of the former Chelsea striker Franco di Santo in the 2-2 draw with Stoke city during the weekend. The Argentine striker was brought to the DW stadium a few seasons ago by the manager Roberto Martinez for around £ 1 million. He has certainly benefited from the prospect of playing regular first-team football. He was one of the best players for Wigan during the final six months of an astonishing campaign last time around. Now, he has continued the good run of form this season as well.

He was one of the key members in the 2-2 draw at Stoke city during the weekend. Wigan have been working hard in order to avoid yet another poor start to the Premier league season. This 2-2 draw at Stoke city provides them with great belief going forward, although they need to tighten up at the back according to the manager Roberto Martinez. After the end of the match, he was in glowing praise of the Argentine striker, who scored in the 49th minute through a wonderful counter-attacking move. This was the fifth goal in just eight matches for Franco di Santo.

“He is a striker with a tremendous touch, great finishing and energy and I think he can be outstanding in every aspect as a centre-forward. You look at the second goal and it is as good as you are going to see in terms of centre-forward play. He is doing his duties defensively, in the counter-attack there is outstanding link-up play with his partner, and then he is as composed as you can be in the box,” said the Wigan manager after the match. Despite such efforts, Wigan still find themselves close to the relegation zone.

WIGAN WARY OF FULHAM

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The Wigan athletic striker Franco di Santo has said that the team should be extremely aware of the threat posed by Fulham. Wigan will be taking on Fulham during the weekend knowing that they should bounce back as soon as possible from the 4-0 defeat suffered at the hands of Manchester United. This defeat has meant that we can now have only one victory in the four Premier league matches played up until now. Franco di Santo has said that Fulham will be coming into the match against Wigan with great confidence following their 3-0 win over West Brom.

Even more impressive is the fact that the new signing Dimitar Berbatov seems to have settled in extremely well after scoring two goals in his debut match. Franco di Santo reckons that Wigan will be looking at a relegation dogfight once again if they lose this match as well. After the match against Fulham, Wigan will be facing the likes of Sunderland and Everton in the next few matches. Franco di Santo has said that all the upcoming games for Wigan still continue to be tough. Hence, they need to pick up as many points as possible before the Christmas period.

“We have to be ready for Fulham. We have to try and forget about the defeat (Manchester United) and concentrate on the Fulham game. We were very disappointed with the way we played on Saturday, that isn’t how we normally play and it is something we have to try to fix. We will try to get back to the way we play best, attack the other team, if we do well at home this makes the fans happy,” said Franco di Santo ahead of the weekend’s match with Fulham. Wigan have played for matches in the Premier league and have taken only four points from these matches.

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