Rovers didn’t have the resources to make any more changes than the five they did, with Tony Mowbray feeling the inclusion of Aynsley Pears was an important one.

Pears was one of five alterations to the starting line-up, with Ryan Nyambe, Scott Wharton and Harry Pickering all unavailable while Thomas Kaminski Reda Khadra dropped to the bench.

However, captain Darragh Lenihan, midfield trio Lewis Travis, Joe Rothwell and John Buckley as well as top scorer Ben Brereton all started the third round tie.

Lenihan was forced off at half time with a sore knee while Sam Gallagher limped out of the game on the half hour.

Ash Phillips and Adam Wharton were included in a senior matchday squad for the first time and Mowbray said a lack of options was behind his selection ploy.

He said: “I don’t feel we have enough players to change the team. The rest of the bench are players who will be playing for the Under-23s.

“We haven’t got the team behind the team, we might have last year.

“Lenihan and those players had to play in my mind.

“You can’t really legislate for the mistakes today, I thought we controlled the game and looked like a good team.

“We were more in control than the opposition yet we have lost. We’ll move on very quickly.”

Back-up ‘keeper Pears had impressed in wins over Preston North End and Bournemouth last month but lost his place upon Kaminski’s return to fitness.

He had an afternoon to forget as Wigan scored three times in the final half an hour, with Mowbray describing them as mistakes that could be legislated for.

“In defence of Aynsley he didn’t concede a goal in those two-and-a-bit games and did very well for us with his minutes on the pitch,” Mowbray added.

“He’ll be disappointed as we all are.

“When he did well and we were talking about how good it was that Aynsley kept clean sheets how hard they have to work and they don’t get reward at the end of a training week when there’s no game for them.

“With Covid I felt it was right to give the No.2 goalie a chance to play because you never know that Thomas Kaminski might get Covid and he (Pears) has to play so I felt it was an important position to change.

“Ultimately it didn’t pan out well for us.”