There is still fighting talk at Bolton Wanderers even after season of 'trauma and turmoil'
Contemplating Bolton Wanderers' formidable need to win at Stoke City's Britannia Stadium, Owen Coyle lamented a season of "huge trauma and turmoil" which leaves Premier League survival dependent on Queens Park Rangers also losing at Manchester City. While the fans at the Reebok Stadium and more widely rallied round Fabrice Muamba's plight after his cardiac arrest, Coyle pointed also to an injury roster he described as "unprecedented" in his experience as a manager.
Last weekend David Wheater became the latest Wanderers mainstay to suffer long-term injury, out for a projected nine months with a ruptured anterior cruciate ligament; and, with a virus debilitating the dressing room further, Martin Petrov and Chris Eagles are the only two fully fit midfield players for Coyle to select from. Nevertheless the manager delivered the requisite fighting talk for Wanderers, always struggling since a tough beginning to the season, to nip themselves into a 12th consecutive Premier League season.
Already the 11 years since Sam Allardyce led Bolton to promotion in 2001 represent the club's longest top-flight stint since the near 30-year stretch from 1935-64, within which Nat Lofthouse was their lion of a centre-forward. Survival in the modern billionaires' Premier League playground is more difficult for a Lancashire town club, and the chairman, Phil Gartside, has clearly been envisaging for years that relegation may come some day. The Premier League finishes Allardyce achieved with his trademark muscular football between 2004 and his departure in 2007, of eighth, sixth, eighth again in 2006 and seventh, look herculean now.
Two years ago Gartside proposed a two-division Premier League, which would bridge the financial chasm for relegated clubs, widely interpreted as an effort to ease the ups and downs for a former yoyo club like Wanderers. That was circulated to Premier League clubs but never adopted and now, although parachute payments have increased to £48m over four years, that still represents a big fall from the top-flight riches of around £40m per season from TV alone, even at the bottom.
Coyle, contemplating what he described as "the ultimate must-win game" at Stoke, talked positive, and said: "We know this is the last chance saloon and we have to be ready to capitalise on that. The lads are desperate to go out there and win the game for this magnificent club."
The manager, who seriously upset Burnley when he left in January 2010, describing Bolton as a bigger club, pointed to his team's decent away record this season to conjure a vision of being victorious at the Britannia. Bolton have won away at QPR, 4-0 on the opening day of the season, and at Everton and Aston Villa, which Coyle raised as holding the promise of a great escape this weekend.
"There are only six more teams in the Premier League that have won more away games than Bolton Wanderers," he said. "As a result we know we are capable of going to places and winning tough matches. There have been games this season where people have tagged them as 'must-win' and we have done."
Bolton have also beaten both their Lancashire relegation rivals away, Wigan Athletic and Blackburn Rovers, doing the double over Rovers, although Wigan beat them at the Reebok. Somehow this season the slow car crash at Blackburn under Venky's and the remarkable late-season surge by Wigan have overshadowed the struggles of Bolton, who found themselves sandwiched between the other two by the end of October having lost all five home matches since the start of the season.
Coyle has lost key players including Stuart Holden to a knee injury and Lee Chung-yong, who broke his leg. Nigel Reo-Coker has tried to rally a relegation battle while suffering a hamstring problem.
"There has been huge trauma and turmoil in terms of injuries and illness," Coyle said, "but we have just got on with it and always remained grounded."
Should the worst happen and Bolton finally fall out of the Premier League, the club says it will be able to find financial ballast, even if it means borrowing significantly. In recent years Bolton have haemorrhaged losses in the struggle to keep in the top flight, losing £35m in 2010 and another £26m in the year to June 30 2011. The club relies for its day-to-day cash flow on its owner, the Isle of Man-based kettle entrepreneur Edwin Davies, whose loans were up to a huge £99m last year. Davies has not guaranteed to put more money in, only not to demand repayment.
All round, life will be a great deal easier for Bolton Wanderers if Coyle's team can dig out an improbable win in Stoke, and the result at the Etihad Stadium favours him, not QPR's Mark Hughes. Read More
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