Twenty years ago, Nathan Ellington fired unfancied Wigan Athletic to the top flight for the first time in their history – he recounts the ride from third tier to Premier League…
Football’s road to success has never been well signposted. Transfers that appear to be no-brainers can turn into nightmares. Others that fail to get the pulse racing can catapult a player into the big time. Nothing is guaranteed.
Nathan Ellington wasn’t sure which path he was taking when he agreed to join Wigan Athletic from Bristol Rovers back in March 2002. The Latics had been an established third-tier side since JJB Sports founder Dave Whelan had bought the club seven years earlier, but in a town where rugby league ruled, the JJB Stadium hardly felt like the centre of the footballing universe.
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“It seemed a decent enough move to a club one division higher, but you can never be sure,” the former marksman, 43, tells FFT. “But after I joined, I soon realised just how ambitious they were. The owner and the gaffer, Paul Jewell, were talking about reaching the Premier League, and when I started training with the lads I could see why. They were a cracking group of players.
“Andy Liddell was a great goalscorer and I learnt so much from him about finishing. We had a young Leighton Baines, who already had such a sweet left foot. He was so quiet, really into his music, but he was a tough little player and a brilliant set-piece taker. Jimmy Bullard then arrived and was a top-class midfielder and so crucial to the squad camaraderie, constantly playing tricks on people. John Filan was a wall in goal – he never made an error. It was a very good team.”
Nicknamed ‘The Duke’ after his jazz-pioneering namesake, Ellington had banged them in at Rovers, plundering 30 league goals across the previous two campaigns, and Wigan were hoping that the 20-year-old could power them to promotion. He signed in time to net twice in three appearances at the end of the 2001/02 season as the Latics finished a respectable 10th, then hit 15 league goals in his first full year there. That helped to fire Jewell’s men to the title with 100 points – some 14 clear of second-placed Crewe.
“Even after we were promoted to the Championship, the gaffer was saying that he wanted us to kick on – to go for promotion again,” says Ellington, with a laugh. “A lot of managers say that sort of thing, but Paul meant it. Wigan in the Premier League? It seemed like a pretty wild idea, but we totally bought into it.”
Early performances backed up Jewell’s optimism: his side took 19 points from the first 24 available. Ultimately they fell two points short of the play-off places, but while the Latics didn’t achieve their objective, they could reflect on a superb campaign. What’s more, that 2003/04 season marked the arrival of a forward who would play a pivotal role in future successes: Jason Roberts.
“I’d been banging on at Paul for ages to sign Jason, having struck up a good partnership with him back at Bristol Rovers,” reminisces Ellington. “He’d been like a big brother to me, after we found out we’d grown up in the same town and even attended the same school. It was meant to be.”
The 25-year-old Roberts joined the Latics in January 2004 for a club-record £1.4 million and immediately set about paying them back in goals, scoring in his first 14 league appearances and picking up where he had left off with Ellington.
“It’s a cliché in football, but it really was like telepathy between us,” recalls the latter. “Jason was so intelligent, he was a lethal finisher, and we just knew where the other one would be all the time. It was very easy playing with him.”
Roberts helped to elevate his new team to another level throughout the following season. Wigan went 17 games unbeaten at the start of the 2004/05 Championship campaign, a run which included wins over Brighton, Sheffield United and Leeds.
“We were so strong from the off and got better and better as the matches ticked by,” says Ellington, smiling. “We weren’t just winning but blowing teams away. I was scoring goals, Jason was scoring goals, and weekends couldn’t come around quick enough.”
The duo contributed 45 league goals between them that season, creating a symphony the original Duke would have been proud of. Ellington nabbed the lion’s share to win the Golden Boot with 24 strikes.
“That was probably the best season of my career,” he says, grinning. “I never played with such freedom and joy before or since. The whole town was buzzing. We started getting bigger and bigger attendances as the season progressed.”
A little wobble in late March and early April led to the Latics slipping out of the automatic promotion places. However, they recovered sufficiently to know that a win on the final day against Reading would guarantee promotion – second behind Roy Keane’s Sunderland – to England’s top flight for the first time in the club’s history.
“No words can really describe a day like that,” beams Ellington. “There was no room for error. The JJB was bouncing and tensions were high. We didn’t want to have to go through the dramas of the play-offs – it had to be that day.”
Midfielder Lee McCulloch settled the hosts’ nerves after 18 minutes, then the demolition duo of Roberts and Ellington both netted in a comfortable 3-1 victory. Wigan Athletic, who had been elected to the Football League as late as 1978, had made it to the promised land.
“When the final whistle blew, it was pure euphoria,” remembers Ellington, who was named alongside Roberts and Bullard in the Championship team of the season. “You always dream about playing in the Premier League, but I’d be lying if I told you I’d expected to do it at Wigan. But we thoroughly deserved it – from the owner, to the gaffer, to the players and staff. It was an incredible feeling that day.”
Alas, the Duke would never represent the Latics in the top flight. After failing to agree fresh terms with the club, he signed for West Bromwich Albion in the summer of 2005. The Baggies had just performed their own great escape to stay in the Premier League on the final day of the previous campaign.
“West Brom were obviously a big club and I really enjoyed my spell at The Hawthorns, but I never hit the heights I had done at Wigan,” laments a player who scored five Premier League goals in 2005/06 as the Baggies were relegated.
Wigan, on the other hand, finished in the top half as Roberts struck up a new partnership with Senegalese frontman Henri Camara. “I was thrilled for Jason and my old team-mates,” Ellington tells FFT, before confessing, “but it was tough to watch, knowing that I should have still been part of that squad.”
Wigan would survive another seven seasons in the Premier League before going down under Roberto Martinez in 2012/13 – the same year they pulled off one of the greatest FA Cup triumphs in history. Whelan sold the club in 2018, with Wigan since having experienced financial hardship, administration and plenty of bouncing between the lower leagues. But they’ll always have that rise to the Premier League and the silverware that followed.
“The owner, Dave Whelan, absolutely deserved that FA Cup fairy tale story for everything he’d put into Wigan,” says Ellington, smiling. “It’s a fantastic club, and helping to play a small part in that story is something I’m proud of.”
