The ten minutes before kick off at the DW stadium on Saturday sure was pretty interesting as one of football's most colourful characters bid farewell to the game.

Wigan's 78 year old chairman and owner Dave Whelan had announced he was stepping down from the chairmanship the previous Tuesday, it was then announced his farewell speech would take place before kick-off against the one and only Leeds United and 5000 travelling partisan unforgiving supporters.

Me and my three boys had made it up to Wigan nice and early, had time for a quick stroll in the sunshine and a pie in town before parking the car 10 minutes away from the ground on some wasteland (which unnervingly had become a gypsy camp by the time we got back!) and were enjoying the building atmosphere and some cracking northern soul tunes before the pre-match announcer urged the home-fans to take to their seats because "Me Whelan" would be taking to the pitch shortly.

I quietly watched the reaction if the Leeds fans, as did many. Some of our travelling number clapped the former Blackburn Rovers cup finalist and Wigan legend who transformed the club struggling in the fourth tier of English football in a crumbling old football ground to Premiership new-comers in a modern 25,000 stadium, the pinnacle being 2013's epic FA Cup win over Manchester City.

Sadly for Wigan they seem to be on the verge of replicating our own unwanted 2006/07 achievement of going from the Championship play-offs to relegation in just 12 months, however Dave was afforded a brilliant reception from three-sides of the stadium at least.

Clearly rankled by some of his hecklers on the away end, Mr Whelan turned to the north stand and reminded us that it was "25 years since Leeds United won the cup" we wish! It will be 44 years at least! He also acknowledged that we were a superb set of supporters and a fantastic club but that got drowned out by the boos.

Personally I though we could have been a bit more charitable towards a grandfather who was handing over the mantle of the Chairman's role to his Grandson. He's ploughed millions of his own hard earned money into his hometown team and what would we do now for a Leeds-born equivalent? rather than the current set-up of a likeable but madcap Italian banned until May, frantically trying to clear his name in the Italian courts but facing further litigation surrounding other alleged tax offences.

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I couldn't really get away without mentioning the allegations of racism that blighted the final throes of Whelan's tenure at his self-named stadium. As I recall Whelan was chastised for comments made about the Jewish community which to put it politely seemed to imply they have terrific business acumen, digging himself deeper in a follow-up interview he seemed to suggest he couldn't see what all the fuss was about using a derogatory term towards Chinese people (which his then new manager Malky Mackay allegedly used towards his former employer the risible Vincent Tan) as well as bringing a new-to-me offensive term to describe the Oriental community, which rhymes with a well-known Chuck Berry song.

Despite this, I honestly don't believe that Whelan is a hard-core dyed-in-the-wool racist and at the very worst is just a silly old fool with outdated terminology who was caught off-guard by a Guardian journalist, worst luck for him. As one of those who was silent during his speech I'd like to think it was all just a bit of good natured banter between both sides and genuinely hope Mr Whelan enjoys a long and happy semi-retirement.

Photo: Action Images

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