Saturday 23rd October

[stevowanderer]

I see Evatt is calling us "bullies" even though we only committed one more foul than his team.

He also claims that the two late goals were down to his tactics as they will always cause the opposition to become exhausted.

May be true against us as we are bang average but didn't seem to work against Wigan, though, did it?

I don’t think him saying you bullied us is disrespectful. As soon as your 2 front men pulled off Santos onto someone else you destroyed us physically and looked a real threat from set pieces. What type of team would you say you are… you are a direct team that looks to bully the opposition. That doesn’t mean fouls. And we are shit against those types of teams. Wyke bullied us the previous week and Wigan had a lot of quality around that to put us away, if you had similar quality you would have been 3-4 up like Wigan were. And Matt Smith bullied us for Rotherham.

His whole ethos is around keeping the ball and eventually the opposition will tire. Sometimes that is frustrating but you could see how tired you were after 70-75mins. I’m as surprised as some of your fans that evans didn’t make changes earlier. If the game had gone on another 5-10 mins we would have won it despite being absolutely shocking for most of it.

Most Bolton fans realise that we have just been promoted and don’t expect to get back to back promotions. Some still think we should be in the prem but there’s no helping those people…I said in pre season that mid table would be a good season and that’s where we are. If we don’t learn how to defend properly, defend set pieces etc then we will struggle especially considering how bad we are at taking our own chances. We have a long way to go.

 

[Boletus Edulis]

I see Evatt is calling us "bullies" even though we only committed one more foul than his team.

He also claims that the two late goals were down to his tactics as they will always cause the opposition to become exhausted.

May be true against us as we are bang average but didn't seem to work against Wigan, though, did it?

I think i would take any opposition manager's assessment, including our own, with a large pinch of salt. They are talking to an internal audience - fans, players, owners. Last week Evatt suggested Bolton had the best chances in our game.

 

[Boletus Edulis]

He does appear to be a bit moany.

Surely this is just a hard-pressed manager employing distraction tactics. A bit like suddenly shouting "squirrel" and pointing, hoping everyone will look away from the issue right in front of them.

 

[masi51]

He is still a young Manager, but he has 2 promotions on his cv. There was only one reason we got a draw Saturday and that is we may not have the best squad in the division but we certainly have the fittest.
That is down to one person Evatt.
Last January onwards teams got completly blown off the park the last 20 mins. Its not happening every week in this league because fitness levels have closed. Saturday was a exception

Sarcevics let down was he flitted in and out of games....on his game the best player on the pitch
Off his game very anonymous.

 

[Vanni]

I wasn’t there so only listened to the radio - I can only go on MJ’s words.

It sounded like we were awful first half and only started playing after about 35-40 mins, this is becoming all too regular. Somehow Bonner has got to get us starting games more quickly.

I can’t make my mind up on the red card. On the highlights it looks like he wins the ball but I can’t tell whether his non tackling foot leaves the ground or not (which would determine whether it’s a lunge or not). It certainly isn’t two footed. But maybe the angle is making it look less like a lunge than it actually is. I hope we appeal it based on the fottage as it looks like we could win the appeal and because we are ridiculously short on midfielders for Doncaster on Tuesday.

Anyway the red changed the game as we sounded like we were more than holding our own between Iredale’s screamer and the sending off. Sounded like we folded like a pack of cards afterwards.

''Fottage''? What next, 'keppers'?

Seriously though, I'm with Tom regarding the red car as you can't go lunging in like that nowadays. I'm pretty sure the decision will not be overturned though it would be handy if the appeal's not heard until we play Donny so Adam May can be in the side. But having said that I think the ref was reaching for the yellow card but the reaction of 2 or 3 Shrews players forced him to dish out the red card instead.

Tom's comment about us seemingly only having one game plan and sticking to it irrespective of the opposition is spot on. I know we don't have the luxury of a 30 man squad but it seems to me that the game plan is the same whether we're up against Wednesday or Gillingham. It sure is irritating to see that we can take points off the fancied sides but then struggle against those sides that are expected to be down there with us fighting to stay up. And it's not only about the final result but about performances as well. Gills at home was poor, likewise the first half at Crewe and of course the latest episode at Shrewsbury who should've been 3-0 up going into the break.

 

[Luke Imp]

No point in a new thread but it's Doncaster vs Cambridge and Wigan vs Lincoln tonight. I'm assuming the former is a rearranged international one like ours?

Don't think we have any new injuries, just the usual spine of our team.

We haven't kept a clean sheet this season and we don't generally score more than one, so stay in the game as long as possible!

 

[huddsmoose]

Yeah, ours is rearranged too due to internationals (Donny were too scared to take us on earlier in the season).

We've got some serious selection issues, which is not ideal off the back of some poor form. Only one fit central midfielder, looks like we're having to get an emergency loan keeper in, not sure if we've only got one CB fit too.

We're slipping down the table a bit with a lot of draws but I'd probably take a point again tonight tbf with the issues we have and the fact that it'd mean Donny don't close the gap.

 

[Arbury]

Yeah I’d definitely take a point to when you look at what’s going on, such a difference to when we was originally meant to play this, confidence was high and we was on a roll.

KTF

 

[DearneValleyRover]

Yeah, ours is rearranged too due to internationals (Donny were too scared to take us on earlier in the season).

We've got some serious selection issues, which is not ideal off the back of some poor form. Only one fit central midfielder, looks like we're having to get an emergency loan keeper in, not sure if we've only got one CB fit too.

We're slipping down the table a bit with a lot of draws but I'd probably take a point again tonight tbf with the issues we have and the fact that it'd mean Donny don't close the gap.

Yeah right, we still have injury problems so nothings changed except those pesky international players are back. If you don’t sit back you will probably take all 3 points as our back line is made of glass.