Bolton Preview

[ontwowheels]

Get in.

"Hughes said: "I have support from the chairman (John Williams) and the board. That is something you do not give up lightly." Obviously sounds like he's going then (not)!

[RevidgeBlue]

Nothing different to what he has said previously, he seems to be upping the ante for himself and tacitly setting the conditions under which he would accept the Newcastle job or indeed any other post.

[Fife Rover]

I bet Fulham wished they paid 4 million now!

I bet Roberts wished he didn't score because teams will have to pay 4 million now!

I bet Hughes is glad he told teams to pay 4 million otherwise he would have gone by now!

The price has just gone up to £8m!!

[bob fleming]

Interesting how the pompy board spoke out against Redknapp joining Newcastle, What are our board doing??? i think working out how much compensation they will get.

If he does go, thanks for selling our best midfielder

You're not all there are you? Sav? Ha! That's why he's at Derby pal.

[Fife Rover]

Lets get some quality in the midfield and go from there.

Sidwell anyone?

I would go for that. Probably the best we can hope for within our price range.

[RevidgeBlue]

Contrary to many posters I thought Dunn played really well today but I thought Reid was somewhat off the pace.

May be a while yet before he gets back to his absolute best. If at all.

Anything's preferable to the Axe though.

[joey_big_nose]

Only caught the second half but I thought Reid looked good... Spread the ball well, got involved

[AggyBlue]

We thought we had problems with our drummer. What the hell was that today? I though the Boys Brigade had sneaked in

[only2garners]

We thought we had problems with our drummer. What the hell was that today? I though the Boys Brigade had sneaked in

That excuse for a noise you heard was the Bolton band, almost impossible to strike up any sort of song whilst they were playing - made our lads seem excellent.

For me the game changed at half time when presumably Hughes told them what they were doing wrong. In the first half we allowed ourselves to be drawn into a long ball, stick it in the penalty area, shove a few folk around and fall over style that Bolton are masters of. In the second half they realised that all they had to do was play the ball around on the floor and we would run rings round them. It was beginning to look like we were not going to get what we deserved but it came all right in the end. How many times have we scored right at the end at the Reebok? I can remember Yorke's equaliser in the 95th minutes one year.

[Tim Southampton Rover]

The reason we had a drastic turn around in our second half performance was because they were inspired by our male cheerleader. Fact!

[Plastic Head]

Those are the ones and in any case, Gerard Houllier is the fans preferred choice.

Sir John Hall has told the barcodes to dismiss the idea of a new Keegan/Shearer era, I bet they are well chuffed with him !

God I hope it's Houllier...got £2 at 140 on Betfair...

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

The usual game of two halves with Rovers, first half we were comfortable without ever really getting going. Wimbolton's goal came out of the blue, Reidy fast asleep ball watching- he should have got under that high ball and prevented Nolan getting off a clean shot.

Second half we were at them from the whistle and bossed the half, Samba's goal was a bit fortunate but Roberts ran them ragged at the end. As I said the team that wanted it most would win, and for once we did !

That's the worst Wimbolton side I've see a long while, that style of " Football " will kill the game dead , all they do is launch free-kicks and throw ins into the box- pathetic !

If they stay up there must be some bad teams in the Prem.

Scores

Freide 6 Can't remember him making a save !l

Ooijer 6 Solid performance, doesn't do much going forward but he knows where to play at the back.

Samba 7 More like his old self, got lucky with the header. Should have taken Davies instead of Nelsen.

Nelsen- 6 Better but he's still struggling to find last seasons form.

Warnock 7 More like the Warnock of old.

Bentley 8* For me our best player, when he gets the ball things happen.

Reid 6 Taking a while to re establish himself, not in the game enough, he has 10-15 minutes spells where he goes missing.

Dunn 7 Worked hard without ever really shining.

Pedersen 5 The usual, could have wrapped the game up near the end, last season he would have buried that cross shot.

Santa Cruz 7 Put himself about without looking fully fit, the service he got wasn't great.

McCarthy 6 Looked bright today but gives the ball away too much, how many times did moves break down as soon as he got the ball.

Subs Roberts 7 Meant business when he came on, won us the game, for me he has to start soon.

Zurab 6 Did ok, they didn't have the brains or the player who could run at him.

Derbyshire ? Came on to run down the clock.

My view on the Hughes situation, if the geordies want him he's off. Same applies to the next " big" job that crops up.

[RoyRover]

I'm delighted with the win. Hopefully our second half performance will convince Hughes to stay with a club that is only six points off fourth in the table and not go to a team that has gone to the dogs! We deserved the win from our second half performance. I thought the whole team played much better, created a number of chances and in the end got a vital three points. I thought that Reid had a good game, although he is still getting back to the pace of the Premiership. Pedersen looked half decent today, which is something and was unlucky not to score. I was glad to see Zurab getting another run out, he did well when he came on. The introduction of Roberts was obviously a major turning point. Bolton simply couldn't deal with his physical presence and he deserved his goal. Overall I'm happy with the win, we are still some way off the standard that we set at the start of the season, but as long as we bring in some new players and Hughes stays we can have a good second half of the season.

[Blue blood]

Another much needed 3 points to keep us in the race for top 6.

Thought the first half was unconvincing from rovers, bolton played much better, and more attractive football, and we were limited to half chances and things didn't quite click. Having said that Bolton didn't have much, and would have had nothing, had Reid been marking Nolan closer. Biggest worry was again the midfield was too deep, and the front 2 isolated - is this deep lying midfield deliberate by Hughes?

Second half was much better, and we grew as the game went on. As it was the final twenty minutes we were all over them and deserved winners. At times our passing was absolutely top notch and we were spraying it about brilliantly. If only we could keep it up for longer periods.

Thought our full backs were excellent today. Not Ooijer's biggest fan but thought he had a good game. My man of the match had roberts not made such an impact. Roberts showed why we should keep him, as he offers something different to our other strikers. I'd play him more, although think the Benni-Rocque combo works very well, and games like this (and I'd have thought games like sunderland and derby) are just to his style of play. Today he really held the ball up well and brought others into the game. He's certainly keeping the first choice strikers on their toes with performance like that.

Wasn't entirely convinced by our centre mids today - both seemed off the pace and didn't really support the front two. A box to box midfielder (or a defensive one allowing the other to play further up) would be an excellent addition whilst these two try regaining full fitness.

[cn174]

Thought the first half was unconvincing from rovers, bolton played much better, and more attractive football, and we were limited to half chances and things didn't quite click. Having said that Bolton didn't have much, and would have had nothing, had Reid been marking Nolan closer. Biggest worry was again the midfield was too deep, and the front 2 isolated - is this deep lying midfield deliberate by Hughes?

Attractive??? Better probably yes, but at no point could you describe their football as attractive.

[Blue blood]

Attractive??? Better probably yes, but at no point could you describe their football as attractive.

Maybe threatening would be a better word. Imo it was a lot better; they put in a lot of effort into it and penned us it. Rovers did well to limit them to a couple of chances.

[Diziet]

Very interesting body language on that BBC clip - Hughes has been wittering away happily about the game and all of a sudden when he's asked about the Newcastle job his verbal fluency deserts him, he starts fidgeting and looking shifty and generally very uncomfortable.

Personally I wouldn't cross my front room to do anything for the whining barcodes with their overblown sense of entitlement, but I can understand why someone as confident in his abilities as MH might want to test himself at it - high risk, as BFS now knows, but very high upside if it works.

I suspect it will all come down to whether or not he thinks he can work with that pillock in the replica shirt. Let's hope the answer's no

[RoverInWigan]

In respect of todays game i thought we were poor first half but the strong performance in the second half made up for it we limited the home side to very few chances and could perhaps of scored more on another day. I think both Bentley and Cruz had off games today although neither were really poor and made contributions to the game. I think todays game and the last few have shown that we need to stregthen the centre midfield area so i will be loking for a new centre mid signing this January( any suggestions) we seem to have lost that bite we had last season and the 'bully boy' in us has seemed to fizzle out and we seem to be too 'nice' now maybe that has affected us.

I thought it was a great tactical change from Hughes to bring on Roberts and maybe he has shown us that he can offer us something up front , he was strong, pacy and determined but maybe he was putting himself in the shop window. in my opinion when Roberts plays like today he forms a better partnership with Cruz then benni n cruz.

[Paul Mellelieu]

"overblown sense of entitlement"

That's spot on.

[Fife Rover]

A faily dross first half performance followed by a very good second. Bolton were poor all game but in the end we exposed that. Thought Morten played quite well. Midfield pairing were a bit disappointing but they didnt get forward as much as they could. I'm now fairly convinced the midfield two are told to hold rather than press on.

I don't think Bolton were poor at any point in the match. They got their tactics right from the 1st whistle. They were pressing Rovers in every single part of the pitch and gave us no time at all to settle on the ball and use it effectively.

Rovers did very well to contain them in the first half, and then got on top in the second. But at no time until the final whistle went did I think Bolton were out of it. Quite a tough match but also entertaining in it's own way. Very good result.

I think we should try and keep Roberts; he caused more problems for the Bolton defence in the short time he was on than Benni and RSC had done between them all day. Oh and by the way, we do also badly need some creativity in midfield.

[Daremz]

I liked two things:

Ooijer, back in defence, just showed he gives us more choice. He's experienced and he can play football. Great, great match. Proud of you, Andre!!

But the best thing was that probably the WHOLE team celebrated that JR-goal. Really made me proud and gave me the faith that we have things straight, now Robbie's out. We can do this. Proud of you lads, and proud to be a Rover!

[Paul]

Watched this on the box, first half was pretty dire but I thought our second half performance was tremendous. I was wishing we had gone by 75 minutes! Nice to see the defence have worked out where row Z is when necessary. Excellent 3 points thanks to Roberts. There is no way McCarthy would have scored that goal, though I do think Benni was much better today than in recent weeks.

Good to see the goal celebrations as well, reminded me of the "togetherness" which wa sapparent at Spurs when Samba scored in the dieing moments. Perhaps the team spirit is on the mend ????

[Hasta]

Goals on the t'internet

[Presty On Tour]

anyone see motd2?

instead of our derby win all over the back pages of the rags, it's hughes off 2 geordie land!

[Rovermatt]

Maybe threatening would be a better word. Imo it was a lot better; they put in a lot of effort into it and penned us it. Rovers did well to limit them to a couple of chances.

Are you serious? Bolton were crap and shorn of Anelka and Diouf they had about as much threat up front as Derby at the Nou Camp.