Bolton // For a brief spell, Wigan Athletic were the FA Cup’s improbable Invincibles.
They completed 13 games without losing in anything other than a semi-final penalty shoot-out to Arsenal in April.
Then the 2013 winners, the club whose Wembley Stadium defeat of Manchester City was the greatest shock in a final for a quarter of a century, went to Bolton Wanderers, produced an uninspired display and were deservedly defeated by Zach Clough’s lovely goal on Saturday night.
They are FA Cup specialists no more, the scourge of the favourites no longer, an era has ended.
Yet if consolation can be taken from a substandard display, it may be that they can testify to the damage the FA Cup can do.
In a unique double, Wigan won it and were relegated three days later.
Bolton’s demise came 14 months after a 5-0 FA Cup semi-final thrashing at Wembley, an embarrassment they never recovered from.
These are cautionary tales about clubs who may have been better off had they taken the pragmatic and unromantic option of getting eliminated at the first possible opportunity.
But for their 2013 FA Cup run, Wigan might well be in the Premier League.
Injuries took their toll on a small squad, who raised their game in the knockout competition and suffered as they dropped out of the division.
Last season, they ran out of steam in the play-off semi-final against QPR, the 62nd game of a marathon campaign. Again, it is tempting to wonder if they would have prevailed in the league with a lighter workload.
“We came here today to try and win,” manager Malky Mackay said. They did not and perhaps they could do without the distraction of the FA Cup.
Now they are 23rd in the Championship. Theirs has been a rapid fall from grace.
They were captained by Ben Watson, whose 90th-minute header secured Wigan the only major trophy of their history.
No one else who featured that glorious day started.
Callum McManaman, who tormented Manchester City to win the man of the match award, is banned for a stupid sending off.
Shaun Maloney was a bright substitute who almost levelled, but this might prove a valedictory appearance.
“There have been four or five inquiries for Shaun,” Mackay said. “One bid has been turned down but it may be out of my control.”
He recorded his sixth defeat in eight games in charge.
There has been no managerial honeymoon. Not when his reign began under a backdrop of controversy about texts he exchanged with Cardiff’s former head of recruitment Iain Moody, which remains the subject of an FA investigation.
Chairman Dave Whelan was absent, serving a six-week ban from football activity as a result of his comments – misjudged at best, racist at worst – about Chinese and Jewish people.
There is no longer a feel-good factor about Wigan. They are no longer an endearing success story.
Dismal in the first half, they were decent thereafter, but reliant on defensive excellence.
Wigan’s Omani goalkeeper Ali Al Habsi made four fine saves, denying Clough, Liam Trotter, Liam Feeney and Craig Davies.
James Perch and Ivan Ramis made goal-saving tackles, then Clough exchanged passes with Trotter and chipped Al Habsi.
“The goal capped off a magnificent debut,” Bolton manager Neil Lennon said. “He is a talent. I think he is special.”
The FA Cup has played its part in each club’s undoing, but perhaps it has given Bolton a glimpse of a brighter future.
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