Martinez thrilled as Wigan open account

Wigan boss Roberto Martinez was delighted with his side’s 2-0 win over Southampton at St Mary’s on Saturday.

The result allowed Wigan, who were just seven points clear of the drop zone last term, to take their first points of the new season, and the Spaniard was thrilled with a crucial away win, which came about through goals from Franco di Santo and Arouna Kone.

“To say I am pleased would be an understatement,” Martinez told Sky Sports.

“I am very, very satisfied because we knew how difficult it would be and I thought the first half-an-hour showed that.

“When you come to a newly-promoted side like Southampton with an incredible feeling and momentum from the last two seasons, we knew we would have to cope with that in the first half-an-hour.

“We started to keep the ball well, we opened up a few good opportunities and then to score two goals from open play away from home is always tremendous.”

Southampton boss Nigel Adkins, however, urged his team to keep believing in themselves after slumping to their second loss from their opening two matches.

“Everyone has got to stick together, we’ve touched on it in pre-season,” Adkins told BBC Radio.

“There’s going to be stages where you’re not going to be winning consistently as we have been for the last two seasons.

“At that stage you have to make sure everyone is sticking together and believing in the principles we’ve got and how we want to play and pass the ball.

“There’s always going to be lessons learnt, and that’s the important thing, games are going to be tough, we’ve got to make them tough for the opposition. And when you’re in the ascendancy for long spells like we were today you’ve got to take the chances.

“It’s a relentless division. We had opportunities to score but we haven’t taken them. We’ve got to be ruthless, the goalkeeper’s made some good saves but the harsh reality is you’re going to get punished at this division.”