Report by John Patrick Heeley

Luton Town's Kenilworth Road cheated the cold snap and became the setting for Wigan Athletic's third victory on their travels.

A goal in each half from Simon Haworth and Stefan Bidstrup saw Latics move to second in Division Two and close the gap on leaders Millwall to two points.

Wigan recorded only their third league win away from the JJB Stadium this season at Kenilworth Road after 50 or so Luton fans turned up with shovels to clear the snow from the covers over the pitch.

Many of them are probably now wishing they hadn't bothered after goals from Simon Haworth and Stefan Bidstrup condemned them to their eighth home defeat of the season and plunged them deeper into the relegation drop-zone.

Latics manager returned to the club which gave him his break in football 30 years ago and altered the shape of the team that suffered defeat at the hands of Oldham on Boxing Day.

Rioch used three centre backs recalling Stuart Balmer to the starting line up and moved Andy Liddell into a slot behind forwards Lee Ashcroft and Simon Haworth.

Keith Gillespie was relegated to the bench and Darren Sheridan and Stefan Bidstrup combined to control the middle of the park with Kevin Sharp and Scott Green bossing the flanks.

Roy Carroll was again absent from the squad so Derek Stillie made his 9th start of the season in goal.

It took little over ten minutes for Wigan to take the lead and even at so early a stage in the game, effectively killed off the game.

A Lee Ashcroft cross from the left found SIMON HAWORTH who had stole in behind Luton's last defender and hit a sweet side-footed half volley over the helpless Mark Ovendale for his 11th goal of the season..

Wigan didn't have many more chances in the first half and Arjan De Zeeuw's defence shut up shop giving Luton no way through.

HALF TIME: Luton 0 Wigan 1

Luton's best chance came shortly after the restart when Lee Nogan forced Stillie into making a full length save to push the ball around the post.

Wigan doubled their lead on 54 minutes but have the Luton keeper to thank for gifting them the goal.

A Darren Sheridan corner from the right was met by Ovendale but he fumbled the ball allowing STEFAN BIDSTRUP to sneak in and head over two defenders on the line for his 2nd goal since joining Latics.

Bidstrup came close to adding a third 4 minutes later but his shot from the edge of the area went marginally wide of the target.

Luton forward Andrew Fotiadis should have pulled one back for the Hatters on the hour mark but aimed his header from close range straight at Derek Stillie.

With less than ten minutes of normal time remaining Fotiadis popped up to meet a cross but fired way over the bar as time ran out for the home side.

The result moved Wigan into second spot and with Millwall going down to a last minute goal at home to Notts County the gap has been reduced to two points.

With two home games within a week the trip to the New Den on the 13th is getting more and more mouthwatering.