Wigan Athletic boss on going ‘toe to toe’ with League One champions Portsmouth – and injury update on six stars

Shaun Maloney wants Wigan Athletic to go ‘toe to toe’ with League One champions Portsmouth this weekend – and ‘come away with no regrets’. Pompey clinched the title in midweek by beating Barnsley, which kicked off a party on the south coast that will go on for some time.

several of the players – including former Latics man Callum Lang – have been making the most of the celebrations, in joyous scenes posted on social media. But Maloney is preparing Latics for ‘the very best version’ of Pompey on Saturday.

“It can go either way in my experience of these types of moments,” he said. “But all we can do is prepare for the very best version of Portsmouth. “They’re a very good side in and out of possession, with some very good players individually. “They went strong again in January, recruitment wise, and they have to take a lot of credit for that.

“They’ve obviously achieved what they set out to achieve, and they’ll want to finish their home campaign on a positive note.” Pompey edged the corresponding fixture at the DW back in September by the odd goal in three, with Latics having to play almost half of the game with 10 men after Charlie Wyke was sent off.

“I actually really enjoyed the first game here, we tried to go toe to toe with them,” acknowledged Maloney.

“Obviously we went down to 10 men just after half-time, but we still tried to go toe to toe with them, and we gave a good account of ourselves. “We’ll be aiming to do the same thing again, and let’s see what we have. As long as the mentality is right, both with and without the ball, we’ll give as good as we get and come away with no regrets.” Latics Academy product Lang, who joined Portsmouth in January, started on the bench in midweek, but Maloney is expecting him to feature from the off this time.

“They made a few changes for the last game, but I’d be very surprised if Langy didn’t play in this one,” he said. “He’s a really good player, a really good person, and it’s nice to see him doing well.” Maloney also provided an injury update on several first-teamers.

“Luke Chambers and Sean Clare trained on Thursday, and they’ll come into contention,” he added. “Stephen Humphrys, Liam Shaw and Jordan Jones are still unavailable and, as I’ve said before, the end of the season will just come too quickly for Josh Stones.”