Southampton 0-2 Wigan
Southampton started their season in midweek with a baptism of fire as they took on current Premier League champions Manchester City and lets be honest they surprised everyone putting up not only a good fight but actually took the lead. They looked too build on the good showing against City with a positive result against Wigan, sadly however they failed to get that result.
The Saints started brightly and came close to opening the scoring inside just 14 minutes as an Adam Lallana shot forced Ali Al Habsi to make an excellent save. Sadly however Southampton's bright start came to nothing as Al Habsi put on an excellent performance.
The deadlock was broken early in the second half as Franco Di Santo put the visitors in the lead finishing off an excellent move for the Latics who came into the match following their open game loss to Chelsea. Southampton tried to equalise and dominated much of the match after going behind but the closest they came was the cross bar with a little over 10 minutes remaining. With a little over a minute of normal time left Wigan doubled their lead and secured the points as Arouna Kone took the ball from Jose Fonte around the halfway line and drove past Kelvin Davis at his nearest post.
This isn't the result any Southampton fan would have wanted, especially not after their excellent performance against the reigning Champions. It was an awful way to mark their first home Premier League fixture in 7 years, however Nigel Adkins shouldn't be too dismayed really as Southampton were the better team even if they did lack a finish to the chances they created. In all honesty the least Southampton deserved was a point and they were unlucky not to get it. It's a lesson to the Southampton players that this league is about finishing your chances as you don't get many of them. Sadly however it'll be Jose Fonte's mistake losing the ball to Kone that will likely be the lasting memory of this match.
Wigan may have lost Victor Moses to Chelsea but with Kone and Di Santo they looked solid in attack and put away the chances that they had, something they have learned over the years. Roberto Martinez however will need to be thankful not to his strikers but to the excellent Al Habsi who's early save kept Wigan in the match, in fact it's fair to say that the keeper is one of the stand out Wigan players and is worth a few points every season due to his ability between the posts. Wigan will likely try to add to their squad with the money from the Moses transfer, and they probably do need it, though Martinez will be proud his men bounced back from last weeks loss against Chelsea and the loss of Moses himself.
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