The Tottenham cockerel was crowing loudly last night as north London's underachievers began to talk of overthrowing a decade of domination by Arsenal. Spurs' weekend defeat of Everton, combined with Arsenal's shock defeat at West Bromwich, means Tottenham willgo into Saturday week's derby match ahead of their local rivals. All we really need is second place..." Wenger was in no mood to discuss such concessions after watching his depleted side take an early lead before offering a team which is already girding itself for another season-long struggle the chance to register a victory that will live for years in the collective memory of its gloriously vociferous supporters.. "There's no point in worrying about it," the man in the replica shirt announced to his glum compadres, glancing out of the window as Warwickshire slid by "Chelsea have already won it. Substitutes not used: Harper (gk), Ramage.Referee: P Dowd (Stoke-on-Trent).Booked: Wigan Francis, Henchoz; Newcastle Ameobi, Taylor, Carr. Sent off: Wigan McCulloch.Man of the match: De Zeeuw.Attendance: 22,374.* Steven Carr yesterday announced his retirement from international football following the Republic of Ireland's failure to qualify for next summer's World Cup finals. The former Tottenham full-back, 29, won 39 caps for Ireland..

It took an Arsenal fan making the sombre train journey back down south to articulate the truth that his team's manager, Ars? Wenger, could not bring himself to utter after a defeat that left the Gunners 14 points adrift of the Premiership leaders. Substitutes not used: Pollitt (gk), McMillan, Jackson.Newcastle United (4-4-2): Given; Carr, Taylor, Boumsong, Elliott (Clark, 88); Bowyer (Ameobi, 37), Parker, Faye (Emre, h-t), N'Zogbia; Shearer, Owen. Nobody will be allowed to get big-headed, not with the manager."The truth is, though, that Wigan have had a nightmare since going second in the table at 2.35pm on Saturday. Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester United leapfrogged them later in the day and Charlton Athletic can overtake them tonight. There! We all knew the bubble would burst.Goals: Roberts (40) 1-0 .Wigan Athletic (4-4-2): Filan; Chimbonda, Henchoz, De Zeeuw, Baines; Bullard (Taylor, 82), Kavanagh, Francis, McCulloch; Roberts, Camara (Connolly, 76).

And there are not too many greater examples of over-achievers prevailing against under-achievers than this Saturday lunchtime result."We knew we could compete at this level," said the Wigan goalkeeper, John Filan "We have not got big names but we play well as a team I don't think that attitude will ever change. Never has English football had a greater craving for a victorious underdog than it now does. But, almost as obviously, Shearer pushed Arjan de Zeeuw in reaching the ball in the first place from a corner by Emre, whose arrival as a substitute after half-time did most to raise Newcastle hopes of staving off a first defeat since the signing of Michael Owen.The officials did not have a good day, Lee McCulloch's foul on Emre five minutes from time barely meriting the red card it brought, but Graeme Souness' exaggerated refusal to criticise them was merely a sideshow to the main event.Despite a Lee Bowyer bobbler against the post, Newcastle created little for a team blessed with such talent and those who thought Wigan last season were all about the bullying of scared defences by Roberts and Nathan Ellington should take note.This was only Roberts' second League goal of 2005-06 and the real eye-opener has been at the other end, where opponents have breached them just five times in nine matches in all competitions; evidence of Jewell's outstanding powers of organisation.Good luck to them. And he cannot even get it into his head that the receipt of the Barclays Manager of the Month Award should automatically be followed by a crushing defeat! Much more of this nonsense and he will have us believing that football in the shadow of the Abramovich billions is not the depressingly predictable business it is cracked down to be. Newcastle United remain, in many ways, in a different world to Jewell's Wigan Athletic but have become the latest big name to find that reputations and resources do not cut much ice at the JJB Stadium.They were picked off in the first half by Jason Roberts, who thumped one first-half shot against the post and another over the line off the body of goalkeeper Shay Given after a classy three-man build-up.Yes, the visitors should have had an equaliser when Alan Shearer's 65th-minute header was clearly over the line before Leighton Baines chested away. I'll stay for as long as they want me."The England captain is well aware of the task facing his team, and has urged them to put memories of this summer's Ashes glory to one side.He said: "Pakistan are a very talented team.