Bolton slipped to a second consecutive defeat after losing 2-1 away to Walsall.
Whether Ian Evatt’s Manager of the Month curse struck today, or whether it came in advance last week, was irrelevant as Eoin Doyle scored again to put us ahead, and the first half seemed decent enough. Doyle and Delfouneso linked up well, and the two combined for that opener. But we couldn’t get to the break ahead, what looked like a foul in the build-up was ignored, Cameron Norman got a ball in and Elijah Adebayo got enough on it for an equaliser. Earlier in that half we could have been looking a two-goal lead, but Nathan Delfouneso was deemed to be offside when he turned in Peter Kioso’s pass.
In the second half we didn’t trouble the Saddlers nearly enough, with not a single shot on target. We also gave the ball away in our own half, which led to Ryan Delaney fouling and then Rory Holden scoring the winner from the resulting free-kick. Our best chance to get an equaliser came straight away, Antoni Sarcevic’s overhead kick deflected onto the post.
Ian Evatt said after the game he didn’t want to win like Walsall did, but we can’t be bullied and outfought like that, especially when we have who knows how many big players. I would also like us to tweak the formation and try a 3-4-3 – Ali Crawford just isn’t affecting matches like we’d like to see him do, our best chances seem to be when we use the wide areas, so get Lloyd Isgrove in, let Delfouenso drift outside when needed, and get the ball to Doyle that way.