Dave Challinor admits Stockport deserved to lose to Wigan

Stockport manager Dave Challinor admitted his side had only themselves to blame for bowing out of the Carabao Cup at the second-round stage at Wigan.

A hugely disappointing game looked as though it was destined for penalties before Fraser Murray headed home fellow substitute Christian Saydee’s cross with five minutes to go to send Wigan through.

With both sides having made a whopping 17 team changes between them, it was perhaps inevitable that the game never really got going.

“It wasn’t a great game, both teams made a lot of changes and you probably saw that led to it being a bit clunky, with not much rhythm,” said Challinor.

“We’ve cost ourselves the game by not defending a routine ball into the box. If you do that then you deserve to lose, and we did.

“It was a close game, with not much in it, and it was always going to be decided by either one moment of quality or a mistake, or it would go all the way to penalties. And that proved to be the case.”

Wigan boss Ryan Lowe said: “I thought it was a little bit cagey in that first half, and it opened up a little bit in the second half.

“The two teams made a lot of changes and obviously it was nice for us to get minutes into a few lads we haven’t seen much of this season.

“All of the lads who came in were excellent, and then the lads who have been playing came on the pitch in the second half and gave us a little bit more of an edge.

“I thought we had to roll the dice a little bit, get those players on the field, and it proved to be the difference.”