It was another defeat at Shrewsbury Town that the long-suffering Latics fans had to endure. Things looked to be going to plan until former Latics’ loanee Freddie Ladapo scored the only goal of the game. It just rubbed salt into the wounds as Ladapo had hardly set Boundary Park alight with his scoring prowess. New signings Anthony Gerrard and Michael Ngoo started the match and Aaron Amadi-Holloway got an appearance as a substitute.
John Sheridan summed up, “It was a disappointing performance. I don’t think there was a lot between the teams, it was a very scrappy game with two teams near the bottom of the table. There was lots of endeavour but sometimes you have to use your head more rather than your feet instead of running around and getting 15 miles under your belt. I’ve seen why the team haven’t been scoring goals because we didn’t hold the ball up, we didn’t keep the ball well enough and we didn’t disturb them, it was too easy. I couldn’t see us losing the game, it was a very soft goal with people going for the same ball.”
“Billy Mckay had the best chance to put us 1-0 up and if he scores there it’s a completely different game but we didn’t play well. We’re very unbalanced at the moment, we don’t have any left footers in the squad and that’s something I’m looking at and hopefully will sort out before the window. They [the new players] are all a bit short of match fitness but the only way they are going to get that is by playing games. We have got a couple coming up quick and fast so we have to sort that out. I’m always disappointed for the fans travelling. We had a good following today and we just give enough to get them going. I think you can see we work hard enough, there is a good work ethic but I want one or two to be a bit more cleverer when picking the right pass or trying something different. I’ve only been here a week so hopefully I can sort that out and build a team who can create more chances and score a few more goals.”
The result was doubly crippling as the three points gained by the Shrews leaves the Latics now six points adrift of safety. These are worrying times.