Promotion-chasing Wigan face tricky tie when travelling to in-form Swindon
The 2nd placed Latics will not have an easy time against a Swindon side who are unbeaten in 7 under caretaker boss Luke Williams
Promotion-chasing Wigan travel to mid-table Swindon on Friday looking to stretch their unbeaten run to 17 games and narrow the 6-point gap to league leaders Burton. With just 9 games left, Gary Caldwell’s men will need to keep picking up points to try and secure an automatic promotion spot and bounce straight back up to the Championship.
After a run of 3 straight draws which saw a chasing Walsall side pull level on points with them, the Latics gained a crucial 1-0 win over Bradford on Saturday thanks to an 80th minute strike from substitute Haris Vuckic. That goal was Wigan’s 60th of the season, an impressive tally bettered only by Gillingham with 64. With 10 goals in their last 6 matches, they have shown no signs of letting up, and have failed to score in just 2 of their last 15 matches. With the clinical Will Grigg up front, and January’s League One Player of the Month Max Power running the midfield, the Latics are a tough opposition for any side and will be confident going into Fridays game.
However Swindon find themselves on a good run of their own – the Robins are unbeaten in 7, and are still in with an outside chance of making the playoffs, currently sitting 8 points off the pace. Caretaker manager Luke Williams has made a good start to his managerial career, and his side have won 6 of the 12 games he has managed them for. With Swindon proving extremely difficult to beat in recent weeks, a draw looks the most likely here and is priced at 12/5.
The visitors will be hoping for a repeat of when these sides met earlier in the season, where Wigan scraped a narrow win thanks to a 96th minute winner. However expect this one to be more exciting – games at the County Ground often tend to be goalfests. In fact 78% of Swindon’s home games have had over 2.5 goals, and with the hosts facing a free-scoring Wigan side, there are bound to be plenty of goals. Back there to be over 2.5 goals at 19/20.
Striker Will Grigg has made an instant impact since joining in the summer, and leads his sides scoring charts with 15 goals this season. Those goals have come from just 53 shots, meaning he has an impressive conversion ratio of just under 1 in 3, and Grigg is great value to score at anytime at 5/4.
Wigan need to maintain their recent run of good form to avoid the lottery of the playoffs, which are a lot like jackpots from online pokies – the rewards are big, but most of the time the odds are that you will lose out.
