While the daffodils may have been tentatively popping their heads above ground, there was little evidence of spring reemerging in Sunderland’s step as the club tried to successfully navigate the closing months of its first-ever Division Three campaign.

After a slowish start that saw just three wins from the opening nine games, the team had quickly hit its straps, winning 15 and drawing three of their next 19 league fixtures. However, a few of the more recent performances hadn’t gone down too well with the supporters, with a more exciting style of play and new recruits demanded in the Echo letters pages.

After an embarrassing home defeat to Hartlepool in the Sherpa Van Trophy, an injury and illness-ravaged squad had drawn away at Preston and beaten Brentford at Roker, before consecutive league defeats away at Bristol Rovers and Aldershot.

A midweek win over Fulham at Roker Park had seemed the perfect stabiliser, but another home game on the Saturday, against Blackpool, saw the game end in a draw, thanks to a controversial refereeing decision that left boss Denis Smith furious and Sunderland with only a point.

The lads, therefore, headed to Wigan with a sense of injustice hanging over them. The Latics were at Springfield Park in those days, rather than their more salubrious setting of today, and on a wet and muddy afternoon Sunderland would have been hoping for a quiet, routine win devoid of any controversy whatsoever.

Of course, it didn’t turn out that way at all.

The pitch was barely playable – if you thought Port Vale’s pitch was bad last weekend, it was pristine Wembley in comparison to this mudbath on which the players were barely able to keep their feet, and any shoots of green grass were cut up in the early exchanges.

Gates, pictured in the following preseason, was at the centre of controversySunderland’s sense of injustice after the Blackpool draw was magnified early on, when they should have had a penalty after 15 minutes. John Kay and Eric Gates played some flowing one-touch football that belied the conditions to set Gary Owers away down the right. His cross was aimed in the direction of Gordon Armstrong, making a surging run into the box, only to be sent sprawling by Wigan’s Stan McEwan. The referee, Michael Peck from Cumbria, gave a free kick outside the box for obstruction, much to the annoyance of the Sunderland players.

Five minutes later, a strong foul by Wigan’s Paul Beesley – who’d later go on to play for Sheffield United and Leeds – on Eric Gates earned the defender a yellow, while moments later Reuben Agboola got the same punishment for a late on on Wigan’s Dave Thompson.

The home team’s striker Paul Jewell, who of course would go on to manage Wigan as well as sully the Mercedes brand in later years, hit the woodwork as the home team went close to breaking the deadlock – which they did just after the half hour. Paul Cook, the man of a million voices, shooting home from close range after Gary Bennett made a mess of clearing a free kick.

Gabbiadini thundered a header off the bar as the first half came to a close, but the teams went in at the interval with Wigan one up.

Smith’s teamtalk must have fired the lads up a bit as Marco equalised moments after the break – holding off former Sunderland defender Alan Kennedy before rounding the keeper and sliding the ball home.

The second half’s opening exchanges had been just as competitive as the first half, but the game exploded just a couple of minutes later – Beesley once again clattering Gates, giving Peck an easy decision to issue a second yellow. The Wigan team and coaching staff were furious, as was Gates, who also got a yellow, presumably for something he said.

Shortly after that, Jewell went in hard on Armstrong – no foul, but Gordon got a yellow for retaliating, while in the following passage of play Chris Thompson of Wigan should have seen red for an awful two footed challenge on Owers.

Sunderland tried to make their numerical advantage count, and Paul Lemon forced an excellent save from Hughes in the Wigan goal. Dave Thompson was brave/stupid enough to clatter John Kay, and from Kay’s resulting free kick Hughes fumbled and had to be rescued by McEwan.

Off the field, the Sunderland supporters behind the goal took to sliding down the muddy away end (a penny for the bus drivers’ thoughts as they got back on the coach after the game!) On the pitch, it looked like a matter of time before Sunderland would score, and that was proven to be the case on 69, with Gates controlling Agboola’s nice ball in from the left, turning on the edge of the box and firing home.

Iain Hesford hadn’t had to do much, but he made a great save from a long range effort to keep the lead in tact – and he was to play a central role in what transpired in the game’s closing stages.

Hesford gathered a ball in from the right in the dying moments of the game, the ball somehow broke loose, and Senior scored a last-gasp equaliser. Then it all kicked off.

Hesford was adament the ball was kicked out of his hands, which according even to the Wigan players post game it was, and he and the Sunderland team were apoplectic at the decision to allow the goal. The final whistle blew, Sunderland surrounded the referee – Bennett saw yellow, Hesford threw his gloves down in disgust, called Mr Peck a cheat, and jostled and pushed him, depending on which reports you read.

In the tunnel, however, things became lawless. Wigan manager Ray Mathias wasn’t happy with Gates’ role in Beesley’s sending off, and ‘went wild’ in the tunnel, ‘attacking’ the former England striker. A mass and prolonged brawl ensued, with a number of Sunderland players coming to Gates’ rescue. Armstrong was punched in the head, and Gates was left shaken and upset by the incident.

Hesford too was still furious about the equalising goal.

I had clearly caught the ball. The next thing I knew was that Steve Senior had kicked it out of my hands. I couldn’t believe it when the referee awarded the goal.

It was a terrible way for the match to end for us and now I will have to wait and worry to see if I’m going to be banned.

After the match, Senior and Wigan’s assistant boss Roy Tunks both told me that it shouldn’t have been a goal. Senior explained that he had to go for the ball with his side chasing an equaliser, but he knew that he had kicked it out of my grasp.

It was no consolation to hear both of them admit that the referee had made a mistake.

It was little consolation for Sunderland, with the draw leaving them in second place – with top of the table Notts County the next visitors to Roker…