Football Results

Third-division Wigan and Premier League Southampton will meet in third quarter-final match of the English FA Cup. Southampton is experiencing troubles in the league and is positioned just one place above the drop zone. On the other hand Wigan is currently 2nd-placed team in the League One. We need to add that the two teams met the last time five years ago in the Premier League and then Wigan won away 2-0 and drew at home 2-2.

Wigan

In the meantime Wigan moved down to the third division of English football league system but it is on its way to return to the Championship next season as this team currently occupies the second place in the League One table and has the same number of points as 3rd-places Shrewsbury despite fact that it played one match fewer. On the other hand, leading Blackburn has five points more but it played even three matches more than Wigan, which won two and drew two out of last four league matches.

This season Wigan did the best job by far in the FA Cup, where it eliminated at home three Premier League team. The first to go down was Bournemouth and was followed by West Ham, while in the round of 16 Wigan won currently leading team of the Premiership and most likely the new champion of England, Manchester City. Wigan won by 1-0 and because of that we expect from manager Cook to send the same starting line-up now against Southampton. Out of action is only from before injured midfielder MacDonald.

Probable lineups Wigan: Walton – Burne, Dunkley, Burn, Elder – Morsy, Power – Perkins, Powell, Jacobs – Grigg

Southampton

We have said in the introduction that the guests from south of England occupy the 17th place in the Premier League table before this quarter-final match of the FA cup, although 18th-placed Crystal Palace and 19th-placed Stoke have just one point fewer. The Saints come into such inenviable situation after the latest four-game winless streak of two defeats and two draws. After last week’s defeat away by Newcastle of even 3-0 the club management has decided to fire Argentinian coach Pellegrino.

In the meantime experienced Welsh Mark Hughes has taken over his place. He led Stoke just two months ago and is well versed in all what is going on in the English elite football league. In order to justify his contract with the Saints we believe that Hughes will try with all his knowledge to put Southampton in the semi-final of the FA Cup, regardless that he cannot count for match with Wigan on injured stopper Yoshida, midfielder Davis and forward Austin.

Probable lineups Southampton: Forster – Soares, Stephens, Hoedt, Bertrand – Romeu, Lemina – Ward-Prowse, Tadic, Redmond – Long

Verdict:

Although third-division Wigan had already eliminated three Premier League teams in previous rounds of the FA Cup, including this season untouchable Manchester Ctiy, we nevertheless have decided to give advantage to the Saints in this quarter-final match, especially as this is an ideal chance for new manager Hughes to prove himself to new employers.

Pick:  Southampton wins 2.15 - 115/100 @1XBet