With a prank dominating the news, it may be an apt time to suggest that the idea much-peddled in pre-season that Wigan Athletic will enjoy anything better than their usual year of struggle is looking more and more like a hoax prediction.

It was Hallowe’en theme night at Craven Cottage and Wigan offered neither tricks nor treats. Their defending, though, was scary — and Andy Johnson profited by scoring his first Fulham goals to send Steve Bruce’s side into the bottom three after this their fourth successive Barclays Premier League defeat.

“It was important for Andy,” Roy Hodgson, the Fulham manager, said. “All goalscorers need that first goal at their new club to get them

kick-started and especially if you’re a big-money signing — by Fulham standards, anyway.” Almost anyone — well, perhaps not the Russian up the road from Craven Cottage — would consider the £10.5 million paid to Everton for Johnson to be a hefty wedge.

It will look good value if the 27-year-old’s goals can elevate Fulham towards the bliss of mid-table mediocrity. His first arrived after ten minutes last night, tapping in Paul Konchesky’s cross — although the striker looked slightly offside. He took off his top to display a T-shirt marking his 100th league goal. Few can have been easier.

Paul Scharner headed over from point-blank range just before half-time, but Wigan did not deserve to draw level, escaped early in the second half when Zoltan Gera, the Fulham winger, hit a post and never looked likely to recover after Johnson scored his second on the hour.

It was a combination of quick thinking and quick running as he sprinted behind the defence to meet Jimmy Bullard’s adroit free kick and angle No 101 low into the far corner. Or slow thinking and slow running from the visiting team, if you prefer. “I don’t think 11-year-olds would defend like that,” Bruce said.

Wigan have won only once in the league since beating Hull City 5-0 at the end of August and while their manager partly attributes that poor record to bad luck, there was no wailing about misfortune yesterday, despite the questionable opening goal.

“It’s possibly the worst performance since I’ve been at the club. It was not acceptable,” Bruce said. “No excuses. We were poor and got what we deserved. I’ll question myself. We’ll have to get back to basics — six or seven players were well below par.”

No doubting the truth of that call.

Fulham (4-4-2): M Schwarzer — J Paintsil, B Hangeland, A Hughes, P Konchesky — S Davies, J Bullard (sub: C Baird, 88min), D Murphy, Z Gera (sub: C Dempsey, 73) — A Johnson (sub: E Nevland, 90), R Zamora. Substitutes not used: P Zuberbühler, J Gray, F Stoor, L Andreasen.

Wigan Athletic (4-4-2): C Kirkland — M Melchiot, E Boyce, P Scharner, M Figueroa (sub: J Koumas, 63) — L Valencia, W Palacios (sub: H Camara, 80), L Cattermole (sub: D de Ridder, 80), K Kilbane — E Heskey, A Zaki. Substitutes not used: M Pollitt, R Taylor, M Brown, T Bramble. Booked: Kilbane, Cattermole.

Referee: H Webb.