Dougie is building something special… And he hasn’t finished yet
While the sun continues to toy with our hopes and emotions, the heat at the Reebok continues to crank up.
Since the days of Sam Alladyce, the beginning of the summer break for Bolton Wanderers fans has usually been a tepid one. The latter part of May and most of June under Megson and Coyle would normally result in only murmurs of potential incomings and grumblings of potential outs. This year, however, Dougie Freedman has started the off-season like a? Well, let us call him The Flying Scotsman, shall we?
Even before the Football League had handed out their awards for the month of April, Dougie had landed two signings in the names of Hayden White and Conor Wilkinson. Recruited for the development squad- but not exclusively- only time will tell for these promising youngsters, but Dougie wasn`t finished with the month of May just yet. Two more recruits, in Marc Tierney and Alex Baptiste had already been convinced to join Bolton`s evolution and agreed terms quicker than it took our current full-backs to realise their places were in jeopardy.
With the defence more than improved, you would have expected the following weeks to be the mandatory murmurs, in or out, but it`s been nothing of the sort. No sooner had two first-team defenders been recruited to improve the ‘goals conceded` tally-table, our manager had turned his attention to improving the ‘goals scored` statistic. Jermaine Beckford and Robert Hall not only were being murmured, they were being negotiated. Now, after the whose, the whys and do you mind if I don`ts, it looks like Dougie has reeled the front pair in. If reports from all camps involved are to be believed, the medicals- especially Hall`s- look to be the only stumbling blocks to the attackers wearing a FibrLec sponsored football kit next season.
The recruitments to date this summer at the Reebok- before the transfer window has even opened- would have the majority of Championship fans swooning like an exhausted Sesame Street Grover. But not only has Dougie said there will be others, the Craig Dawson rumblings of a return continue to register on the Richter scale. Bolton supporters are already frothing at the mouths for the season to get underway and if it feels like the same frenzy of last summer, the opening fixture, away to Burnley, only adds to the déjà vu. This time, however, it feels like genuine optimism rather than the blind faith we had last term purely for being a former Premier League member. A leading pundit has already stated the recruitment of Beckford would make Bolton into a Play-Off team at least. Would the arrival of Dawson, added to the recruits we`ve already made, make Bolton a Promotion team? One thing`s for sure, it certainly would hurt.