After a truly terrible hour of play in which relegation rivals Bolton ease into a two goal lead, the home self-destruct in fine style and the Tigers claim a most unlikely away point after two Stephen Hunt strikes.

Report by Mike Scott.

The magic of the FA Cup eh? I should coco. A crowd of 5,335 (and there is a debate in my mind about whether such a low turn-out should actually comprise a "crowd" under FIFA definitions) turned out on a bitterly cold day, the 800-odd from Hull braving blizzards on the Ainley Top to Birch section of the M62 for the privilege of being there. Wigan's average Premier League gate this season is 18,463 - so despite this being an all-Premier Cup tie, at least 13,128 Wigan and Hull folk stayed away. Lucky sods.

The stats would suggest that this was a game of two halves. Nah, not a bit of it. The first half was so appalling that it didn't really count at all, while the second half comprised of the home side trying intermittently and scoring at will, with City capitulating in a manner that suggested last year's FA Cup antics were firmly NOT on the Tigery agenda this time around. So a game of about half a half then - graced by the presence of the following line-up:

Myhill
Mendy Mouyokolo Zayatte Kilbane
Garcia Geovanni Cairney Halmosi
Vennegoor-of-Hesselink Ghilas

Yep that's right, Peter Halmosi. If our squad were a Beaufort scale of how much the Tigers were trying to win this game, then sellotaping Jimmy Bullard's knees up and throwing him on from the start would represent smashed windows, overturned caravans and flying debris. Choosing Peter Halmosi, on the other hand, represented smoke from chimneys rising unerringly vertically until it reached space. Predictably the Hungarian wide man, denuded of all confidence by spending the last year and a half in City's reserves, stank the place up quite remarkably. He wasn't the only one, on both sides.

In fact our whole midfield had a startlingly lightweight look about it, with the wandering (and cold) Geovanni accompanied on the string-pulling footplate by willing youngster Tom Cairney. Cairney had a rather good game actually, he's very comfy on the ball and he rarely ceded possession. He rarely tackled anyone as well. As one of the Premier League's brightest managers, it only took the uber-IQed genius that is Roberto Martinez an hour to spot this obvious defect in City's engine room and exploit it ruthlessly. Meanwhile us mere humble supporters in the seats consoled ourselves by having spotted the gaping chasm in City's defensive armour after about 8 seconds of play.

Up front we had Vennegoor of Hesselink, who tends to put in a reasonable shift before tiring after 55 minutes, and the supercharged Ghilas, who hares around for what could conceivably be 55 hours without creating a damn thing. At the back we had Zayatte (predictably superb) and Mouyokolo (tidy) centrally, with Mendy (gallicly disinterested) and Kilbane (short of pace) on the wide. Cuh, and to think that we were idly selecting Fourth Round opponents on the terraces at half time … heh, madness!

The DW Stadium (now shorn of all JJB branding, the switch from three letters to two lending a lop-sided look to hoardings, features and entire stands) fell silent as the pumping pre-match house music ceased (thank God) and the match began (oh dear). The scene was set early as passes went astray, crosses lolloped over the goalline and challenges foundered on the harsh rocky outcrops of disinterested half-heartedness. In a bizarre reversal of the plan, Vennegoor of Hesselink found space wide right and crossed to Halmosi, who failed to control a ball slightly behind him. Wigan pounced on this, swiftly whisked the ball to the other end and set up perma-loanee Scott Sinclair to loop a cross-shot onto the top of the crossbar. Thirteen minutes in, unlucky for some as Scotland and Scot-Sinc exchanged passes, the latter crossing to Rodallega who headed wastefully wide. The quality was … erm … indescribable. Let's just say it wasn't great. Scottish wunderkind James McCarthy, no longer an Academical but still a smart looking player, struck a low shot that Myhill clawed away - then Sinclair drove over after a Koumas cross. Oh yeah, Jason Koumas, he played for them. Well, he was selected. He was hauled off at half time. He was woeful. He'll be our customary player-signed-from-Wigan for this transfer window I'd wager, following in the footsteps of Marlon King and Zinedine Kilbane. Perhaps we could swap him for Halmosi in what would comprise football's least impactful transfer deal ever.

On 21 we had a reasonable chance, our first. Vennegoor of Hesselink shielded a Mendy throw then fed the ball sweetly into the path of the advancing Garcia. The shrieking Aussie crossed first time and Ghilas, attacking the near post (well, the vicinity, not the actual post), headed just over.

On 32 we had another reasonable chance, our second. Ghilas hurtled across the face of the Wigan box and a defender obligingly clattered him to the floor. 25 yards out, just to the left of goal - Geovanni territory. Up stepped the mercurial Brazilian, but punters in rows G to J of the away end were ducking even before he struck it, such was the inevitability of this sighter sailing high and wide.

On 34 we had another reasonable chance, our last. Zayatte was clearly irked by the lack of quality in front of him, so he sidestepped a lazily wafted Rodallega leg on halfway, slalomed past a few more as he rampaged forward before being dumped on his arse by a Titus Bramble tackle of remarkable clumsiness. Just to the left of goal, 20 yards out. Geovanni chipped it over the wall and it nestled inside Pollitt's right post. Game over. Literally, for the away side, as it turned out.

Well that's not quite fair actually. Wigan got considerably worse between the goal and half time, and City assumed the upper hand without really threatening a second goal, other than a curling Cairney effort that floated wide after some deft trademark foul-evasion by Garcia. The break was reached with City apparently cruising to the next round. Ah, but what's this? Charles N'Zogbia is coming on for Wigan … are they trying or something? The fiends!

Within seconds of the restart Garcia's first time cross was headed over by Vennegoor of Hesselink. That was the big man's final positive contribution to the game - indeed, it pretty much City's final positive contribution. For seconds later N'Zogbia, with his amusing "left arm outstretched" dribbling style that means he looks like he's permanently leaning on railings when he runs, cut inside a less than convincing Kilbane challenge, ran into space behind City defence and equalised with a low shot slipped past the advancing Myhill. The architect of the goal was Jason Scotland, who was playing a second striker behind Rodallega and had clearly been told at half time that he wasn't going to be tackled by the crash-bang-wallop-free Cairney and Geovanni so could run the show if only he tried. He did … try that is … and run the show, as it turned out. Scotland was the pivotal figure to all of Wigan's attacks for the remainder of the game, a dominant feature that our manager Phil Brown cleverly did absolutely fuck-all about. Crafty so and so that he is.

Scotland fed Rodallega on 49 minutes but the shot was dragged wide. Figueroa traded a nifty 1-2 with Scotland and toddy-ended a punt straight at Myhill. Scotland ran through the middle of our midfield unchallenged and fed N'Zogbia wide right, who cuts inside and struck a low shot identical to his equaliser, except this was pushed wide by Myhill's outstretched glove. Scotland drove forward again and combined with N'Zogbia on the right before passing inside to McCarthy, who shifted the ball from left to right before swiping a weak shot that was trickling towards one corner before taking a wild deflection off, I think, Zayatte and plopping into the opposite corner of Myhill's net. 2-1 to Wigan, and it could have been 12 - all the space of 18 second half minutes.

Inspired by Zayatte's first half foray, on 66 minutes Bramble dispossessed Vennegoor of Hesselink on half way and strode forward with bold endeavour, eventually setting up Scotland for another deflected shot - this one span wide. Wigan took a short corner and after what seemed like about two minutes of waiting for a City player to come and challenge him, N'Zogbia skipped past Halmosi impatiently and smote a replica low shot into the same far corner of Myhill's goal as he had done 20 minutes earlier. 3-1, time for action from Phil Brown.

He withdrew the ineffective Ghilas and bought on Paul McShane - who has lost weight (and indeed height) during the Christmas festivities - and played him up front. Well no he didn't actually, he bought on strawberry blonde youngster Mark Cullen, goalscoring machine of the City youth setup. Young Cullen scampered around a bit, contributed a couple of nice touches, got called "son", "oi" and "mate" a few times by strike partner Big Jan and clattered Amaya to earn his debut yellow card. Fair play to him for all of that - but turn the game he didn't. Neither did George Boateng, who replaced Halmosi and allowed Geovanni to go and sulk briefly on the wing before the Brazilian wizard spent the last 15 minutes at auxiliary left back helping (that's "helping" as in, offering no help at all) Kilbane deal with the refulgent N'Zogbia. Wigan attacked when they could be bothered, but consoled themselves with rolling the ball pleasingly between defenders for much of the last 20 minutes, while City ambled around in a "I'm a bored footballer, get me out of here!" kind of way. Cairney did have a shot deflected wide for a corner and Sinclair was scythed down fairly by a Mouyokolo tackle after a twisting run at the heart of City's defence, which was followed by a brief melee in the six yard area that ended with Rodallega's snapshot being nudged wide by Myhill. Altidore came on, fouled some brothers and moaned a little. He even had a header from a Cullen cross that was misdirected and caught by Pollitt. He'd definitely caught the "don't you dare get us back into this chuffing game" bug.

All that was left to do was negotiate the three minutes of injury time and our work here would be done. Sinclair decided to while the time away by latching onto a pass from a short corner and drilling a low shot from the inside right channel across Myhill and into the far corner of the net - a replica of N'Zogbia's earlier brace, I think Wigan may have spotted a small Kilbane-shaped weakness in our armoury. Released from our torment, we slithered across icy roads back to our cars and headed home. We are out of the Cup. And if that's how hard we are going to try, then good.

HULL CITY (4-4-2): Myhill; Mendy, Zayatte, Mouyokolo, Kilbane; Garcia, Cairney, Geovanni, Halmosi; Vennegoor of Hesselink, Ghilas.  Subs: Cullen (for Ghilas, 67), Boateng (for Halmosi, 71), Altidore (for Vennegoor of Hesselink, 79), Doyle, Dawson, Devitt, Duke.

Goals: Geovanni 35

Booked: Cullen

Sent Off: None

WIGAN ATHLETIC: Pollitt, Bramble, Amaya, Melchiot, Figueroa, Koumas, Sinclair, McCarthy, Thomas, Scotland, Rodallega.  Subs: N'Zogbia (for Koumas, 46), Watson (for Rodallega, 77), Edman, Boyce, Bouaouzan, Gomez, Nicholls.

Goals: N'Zogbia 47, 66; McCarthy 63; Sinclair 90

Booked: None

Sent Off: None

REFEREE:    A Marriner

ATTENDANCE: 5,335