Wigan Athletic picked up their third consecutive home win, with a 1-0 victory against Nottingham Forest on Sunday afternoon. 

Paul Cook’s side dominated the first half, and Jamal Lowe scored his first Latics goal after 35 minutes, finishing off a Gavin Massey cross and the home side continued their strong start to the game as Charlie Mulgrew struck the post from a free-kick.

As expected, Nottingham Forest turned the screw in the second half and created chances of their own. Lewis Grabban missed a golden opportunity to level, before Wigan’s Kal Naismith had a shot brilliantly saved by Brice Samba.

The Latics saw out a deserved victory, with the three points taking them up to 18th in the Championship table, ahead of their visit to Derby County on Wednesday evening.

Here we look at three things we learnt about Wigan after this win over Sabri Lamouchi's side.

Mulgrew has been a brilliant signing

Since Mulgrew has come into the side, Wigan have kept four clean sheets at home in a row. The Scottish international has formed a solid partnership with Chey Dunkley in the heart of the defence.

In a young Wigan team, Mulgrew offers that leadership and quality at the back that Wigan required.

On top of his defensive qualities, Mulgrew brings real quality from set-pieces, and almost doubled Wigan’s lead with a free-kick on the stroke of half-time.

Jamal Lowe is adjusting to life in the Championship

The attacker scored his first goal of the season against Forest, and is improving every week. Lowe scored 17 goals for Portsmouth last season.

However the difference in quality between League One and the Championship is sizeable. Lowe has realised that and adjusted his game in recent weeks.

In League One, Lowe was able to use his directness and pace to hurt defenders, however in the Championship, attacker need to make clever, positive runs and that’s what led to his goal yesterday.

The 25-year-old linked up well with Massey, made a great run into the box and finished well. It’s a big breakthrough for Lowe, and hopefully he can kick-on and score more goals for Latics.

The Latics can grind out wins

It wasn’t a good game yesterday for supporters to witness as it was scrappy and lacked in quality for the majority. Forest could argue they deserved a point after their second half performance.

However, Wigan produced the moment of quality in the first half and took their chance. Cook’s side managed the game well in the closing stages, and could’ve doubled their lead if they exploited the counter-attack opportunities with more quality.

It was a massive three points for Cook and Wigan, they head to Derby on Wednesday full of confidence.

Cook will be hoping that his side can maintain their home form as a positive this season, as they look to keep themselves clear of the bottom three in the Championship.