Shaun Maloney salutes Wigan after completing double over Peterborough

Posted Sunday, February 04, 2024 by PA

Wigan boss Shaun Maloney saluted his side after they completed the double over promotion-chasing Peterborough with a 3-2 victory.

Maloney saw his 10 men survive the dismissal of Matt Smith and a late comeback bid to sink high-flying Posh in a thriller – after also winning the November reverse fixture.

Thelo Aasgaard starred with a double thanks to the Latics’ 20th-minute opener and a third goal in the 85th minute after Smith had seen red in the 76th minute.

And the Norwegian ace is locked in dispute over a hat-trick as Latics’ second goal – seven minutes after the break – was given to captain Josh Magennis after an Aasgaard shot appeared to flick off the striker.

Josh Knight and Ricky-Jade Jones struck as Posh bagged two goals in stoppage time, but a dramatic salvage mission was foiled by the clock.

Latics chief Maloney said: “It was a brilliant team performance and a huge win for us.

“I’ve said openly that Peterborough are the strongest side in the division and that shows how well we had to play to beat them.

“Thelo was brilliant throughout the game. His general play was very good and he is now getting into those areas to score goals. I’ll let him and Josh battle it out for the second one!

“The last three or four minutes was not comfortable at all. I was screaming for the final whistle and I was delighted when it came.

“We’ve been to Derby and Bolton and got results and I’d put this at the same level of those.

“The inconsistency we have is probably just a reflection of where we are as a club and a group just now.

“If we get it right, we’re a decent side and today we definitely got it right.”

Posh boss Darren Ferguson bemoaned his side’s wastefulness.

He said: “It’s been mentioned a few times about us not being ruthless in front of goal and it has caught up with us today.

“I feel that if we scored the first goal we would have won comfortably, but those we conceded were real momentum-shifters.

“They scored with their first shot at goal. We then started the second half terribly and all of a sudden Wigan were 2-0 up.

“We were really naive with the third goal and that one is the killer as we would have got something out of the game had we not let that in.

“I genuinely thought we would get an equaliser after getting two goals back, but the lads were naive again – deciding to take extra passes when we had just scored twice from getting the ball into the box.

“That’s twice we’ve lost to Wigan now. I don’t know how, but we have!

“We can’t feel sorry for ourselves and have to go on. If we get a similar reaction to the last time we lost to Wigan, we’ll be absolutely fine.”