BLACKPOOL SIMPLY SENSATIONAL AGAINST WIGAN

WIGAN 0, BLACKPOOL 4. FOR once, mentions of Blackpool’s illuminations have nothing to do with the seafront.

On an incredible, implausible debut, Ian Holloway’s improbable underdogs lit up the Premier League. Now they tower over the division. They were peerless. This was simply sensational.League goal; to Marlon Harewood, the brace that made it an elegant demolition job; to Holloway, surely, the plaudits for a rapid, radical overhaul of a forgotten club. Pass and move is supposed to be Arsenal’s ethos. Blackpool have borrowed it to make the tangerine dream all the more attractive. This was no smash and grab – it was classy attacking football. It was a club that went from disarray to disbelief in a matter of days. In midweek Holloway denied he was resigning after a frustrating summer in the transfer market. Enter seven signings in 72 hours.
Holloway’s bargain basement version of supermarket sweep paid immediate dividends. Elliot Grandin made a goal. Harewood set up one and scored two more. Charlie Adam sent Harewood surging clear on the right and he rolled an inviting cross to the far post for Taylor-Fletcher to sweep in.Formerly of Northwich Victoria, Grays, Dagenham & Redbridge and Lincoln, Taylor-Fletcher is an unlikely hero. But then they all are. That’s what makes Blackpool so remarkable.
Unwanted at Aston Villa, Harewood had the choice of Premier League Blackpool or League One Huddersfield. It looks like he picked the right one. He opened his account with a 25-yard shot that squirmed under Chris Kirkland’s body.

Having waited 28 months for a Premier League goal, Harewood had a second in five minutes when Kirkland parried Grandin’s shot and the former West Ham man slotted in the rebound.

The rout was completed when a player who was relegated from the Football League in his Mansfield days, Alex Baptiste, scored in the Premier League with a mishit cross. It was an emotional comeback match for referee Mark Halsey after his successful cancer treatment. (Sunday Express)