Erwin sees goals in Latics future

LEE ERWIN

ALMOST exactly 12 months ago, way before the wholesale squad clear-out and with David Dunn in charge, there was plenty of optimism generated by a 3-3 draw at Gillingham.

Athletic entered the game six places higher in the table than they are now but already onto a second manager of the season, after Darren Kelly's short tenure came to an end.

Up against a Gills side that had to that point enjoyed five straight home wins, including an opening-day 4-0 thumping of Sheffield United and a 5-1 hammering of Fleetwood, Athletic fell behind in the eighth minute but recovered to at one stage end up leading 3-2.

TERRORISED

With Cameron Dummigan making his senior debut while on loan from Burnley, Michael Higdon scored twice and Dominic Poleon terrorised the home defence in his best performance for Athletic.

Yet Dummigan and Lee Croft, the latter a substitute, plus unused replacement Carl Winchester and kit man Steve Cross are the only survivors from the squad and staff that day.

Even video analyst Tom Hart has gone, leaving for Wigan at the end of last week and replaced by Conor Marlin.

The promising result led to not much at all. Dunn left 16 games later, was replaced by John Sheridan who helped the club from relegation before decamping to Notts County and virtually all the players ended up elsewhere.

With Stephen Robinson installed as Athletic's newest boss late on in a troubled summer, his was a tough task to build a squad capable of steering clear of relegation trouble.

So far, 15 league and cup games in to his tenure, results away from home have been far better than those at SportsDirect.com Park.

But bad luck has arguably played its part in stopping Athletic from hitting the goals trail as they managed at Priestfield last year - the last time the club managed to register three in a league fixture.

Athletic hit the post twice at Fleetwood on Tuesday, through Billy Mckay and Cameron Burgess.

And that takes the tally of woodwork strikes to NINE for the season.

Three of those have come from Lee Erwin - one each from his head (Walsall), right foot (Bury) and left foot (Coventry).

It goes some way to explaining why statistics show that Athletic are having to hit 22 shots for every goal scored, more than twice the divisional average.

Robinson has more than once suggested that Erwin's powerful strikes are sometimes too cleanly hit for his own good, though the on-loan Leeds striker's very well-taken effort at Fleetwood certainly flew past Chris Neal.

The man himself believes that he and fellow Fleetwood scorer Mckay can prove to be a potent partnership, given the chance.

"The last time we played up front together was Bury and I felt we did very well there and went on to win the game," said Erwin.

"Since then, we have not had a run together but we showed at Fleetwood we can play well in the same side and that we are on the same wavelength.

"So if the gaffer keeps picking us, hopefully we can keep scoring."

The year that followed the last visit to the garden of England hasn't seen Athletic bloom, but Erwin can see green shoots.

"Aside from Swindon and MK Dons, we have really been dominating games recently but haven't managed to get that edge to take three points," the Scot added.

"There have been a lot of draws and obviously, scoring goals has been a problem.

"Hopefully, Fleetwood signals a turning of the tables."