24-year-old Richard Butcher has been the butt of the Latics boo boys recently, and at Barnsley on Saturday the abuse continued to an unacceptable level. So much so that Butcher resorted to giving the "V" sign to an irate woman 'fan' who was over voiciferous and abusive directly to him at the end of the match. Boss Ronnie Moore commented, "There is certainly a section of the crowd who are after him and they were having a go when we were three goals down, but they were nothing to do with him. They were shouting for me to bring him off but there was no way I was going to do that, it could have destroyed the lad. There are some fans who don't like Butcher, but if he is going to stay at this club he has to win them over. I brought him to the club because I wanted a big, strong midfield player. At the moment he isn't that."
"There is no doubt he has capabilities, but the time could be right to bring him out and keep him out while we try to get him to do what we want him to do. But for fans to have a go after 12 minutes wasn't on because nobody came out of the game with any credit."