Report by John Patrick Heeley

Wigan Athletic salvaged a point against Brentford in the season's opener thanks to a Lee McCulloch strike with his first touch of the game and within seconds of him taking to the field to replace Lee Ashcroft.

It was, to pardon the cliche, very much a game of two halves, with the home side struggling to come to grips with the game and seemingly still trying to get used to each other.

Included in the starting line up were Hungarian midfielder Gabor Bukran, former Bradford City defender Ian Nolan and Poland international Darius Adamczuk, with the latter having no experience with the Wigan side whatsoever and in fact was only signed officially on a three month loan deal the previous afternoon.

Paul Mitchell was deservedly given a place in the starting line up after giving a good account of himself during the pre-season friendlies and lined up alongside Arjan de Deeuw and the two summer signings of Jason De Vos and Ian Nolan in defence.

Ged Brannan took his place in a midfield quartet that also included three fresh faces from last season with Darius Adamczuk, Gabor Bukran and Peter Kennedy all making their league debuts for Wigan.

Andy Liddell and Lee Ashcroft made up the forward partnership leaving record signing Lee McCulloch to start the game on the bench.

Wigan had a relatively ineffective start to the game and the only real highlight of the opening encounters was the performance of Gabor Bukran who wasn't afraid to take on the Brentford defence and more importantly wasn't frightened to have a crack at goal and does appear to have a good foot on him.

The former Walsall midfielder tested Gottskalksson's goal on a couple of occasions with drives from 20 odd yards out.

Lee Ashcroft was having a nightmare for the majority of the opening 45 but did on occasion show some nice touches when needed.

However, his partner in crime, Andy Liddell, was the main cause of concern for the Brentford rear guard with his weaving runs forward and it was the Wigan number 7 who came closest in a action deprived first half when he hit a snapshot form 10 yards out only to see Gottskalksson pull off a fantastic reaction save to push the ball over the bar.

With time added on being signalled at three minutes, Newark referee Phil Joslin opted to play four and with virtually the last touch of the half Wigan went behalf with what can only be described as a fluke of a goal, but they all count.

A Paul Evans free-kick form the left took a freak deflection off Icelandic midfielder IVAR INGIMARSSON and the ball looped over Derek Stillie and into the net at the far post.

There were no changes made by either side during the interval but it was the Wigan side that took a different shape as they laid seige to the Brentford half in a bid to rescue the game.

Andy Liddell was again denied by Gottskalksson in the opening minutes as Latics started to take control of the game and were creating more chances as they began to play a more passing game with the side seeming to gel.

However Wigan still couldn't find that killer touch and when the ball went out for a Wigan throw in down the right flank Paul Jewell decided to replace Lee Ashcroft with Lee McCulloch in an attempt to give his side a different option up front.

Ged Brannan took the throw and with a long effort landed the ball in the goalmouth and in the ensuing scramble for the ball LEE MCCULLOCH stabbed the ball home for his fourth goal in a Wigan shirt.

Brentford had a couple of opportunities to steal the match but looked happy to take home a point as the one man attack of Lloyd Owusu didn't really pose too much of a threat and the appearance of Scott Partridge as replacement for Kevin O'Connor was a bit too little, too late for the visitors as they clung on to earn themselves a share of the spoils.

After the game Wigan manager Paul Jewell wasn't the happiest of bunnies with his side's performance and admitted that he needed three or four more new faces and commented on the lack of, what he describes as, a natural scorer.

Good to see that we now have a manager that can see what has been blatantly obvious at Wigan since the departure of Stuart Barlow.