It was meant to be so very, very different. The mid-Christmas trip to Bolton was a chance to get out, have a few beers with mates and watch us put in our usual spirited display against one of the division’s top teams.
Instead, heading back across the M62, the atmosphere was sombre. It felt more like Blue Monday than the festive period, and as usual, fans are again at each others’ throats. That even started before events went south on the field – it’s alleged that a parent of one of our loan players was offering supporters outside for a fight. That’s not very Christmassy, is it?
I’m going to level with you – today’s write-up will be shorter (turns out the final edit is only 200 words shorter…). It’s not a reaction to those rather unpleasant few who have chosen to send me DM’s along the lines of ‘try to make light of that’, nor to the fact there’s not an awful lot to be positive about. It’s simply that I’ve run out of time to do all the things I need to, with too many games coming in such a short period of time. It’s hard to think by this time next week, I’ll have had to write up two more as well.
Everything I write here is honest. The club has zero input in what I write, contrary to some people’s opinions, and I am free to put my actual opinions across. I feel whenever we lose badly, I have to underline that, because the same names keep crawling out to accuse me of being biased and frankly, after eight years, that sort of accusation gets very tiresome, hence the disclaimer.
I thought we started the game badly, first ten minutes Bolton ripped into us with a series of corners and I thought it would be a long afternoon. Then, we began to edge into the game, and I almost dare not use stats to underline this opinion and why I have come to it. The eye test told me from around 10 minutes until they scored, we were on equal footing with them, if not better and I absolutely stand by that. I will use stats (another stick used to bat the site with) to show you – our xG in the first 30 minutes was 0.66, and theirs was 0.08. That’s not close. We had four shots, they had two, we had one on target, they had zero. I don’t care what the dissenters say, that is absolutel proof that, for the first 30 minutes, we were the better side in an average game.
The better side when up against a team with a Premier League quality stadium, with a squad strong enough for them to turn down £1m bids for players. In the summer, they paid £750,000 for Aaron Collins, and on the bench, £500,000 Dion Charles can’t get a kick. I’m sure I sound like a stuck record whenever I roll this out, but we’re punching above our weight when playing teams like this, but because we’ve been doing that for a few seasons, it gets lost. We weren’t on Boxing Day, I grant you that, but Bolton Wanderers? 15 years ago, they beat Atletico Madrid 1-0 in the UEFA Cup, and a couple of days later, we went to Accrington. There’s a chasm between us and them in terms of means, and that can get lost. I’m not hiding behind it, but for me, going there and being the better side for 35 minutes is a fair effort.
Of course, there were some downsides, and the first one is massive. Players being booked for mouthing off is becoming a real problem, and it seems to be the same ones every week. Conor McGrandles picks up a few bookings, but his are usually for tough challenges. I thought he was lucky to stay on the field in real time and having watched it back, my opinion has changed. I suppose the challenge was on a par with Mal Benning’s on Boxing Day, and that was (or should have been) a booking. I can live with bookings for challenges. I cannot live with bookings for yapping off, not when it is week in, week out. This week, Ben House’s card was actually for a foul as well, and in my opinion, it is a weak one.
O’Connor got booked for talking to the referee—that was after Erhahon had been fouled (there was no yellow, by the way, for that). Okay, maybe, just maybe, I can live with the captain standing up for a player. Watching it back, Ross Joyce, a referee I have previously labelled as a clown, couldn’t wait to get his card out for that. It’s not even like Paudie is surrounding him or in his face, either.
Then there’s Ethan Erhahon. He had some rough treatment, and the ref did let a few things go on him. He had a spat with John McAtee, whom I saw three times push his chest into Etham off the ball – we know that wouldn’t be unprovoked. He’d clearly got wound up, and picked up a booking just before half time for his chelp. I can almost forgive that, almost. Lots of players make sure they’re in the ref’s ear to swing decisions and maybe, I can live with it.
I cannot live with that red. It’s a silly and stupid card to pick up and it has undoubtedly cost us any chance of getting something from the game. I can’t see on the replay exactly what has happened, but it’s petulant. I also think it is a little harsh – a referee is meant to try to keep a game at 11 against 11, and I think a stern word would have been enough, but Joyce doesn’t act like that and when you give him a decision to make, he’ll just love to make it. The simple advice? Don’t give him a decision to make.
Before that, we did concede, and it wasn’t a great goal. Paudie dawdled a little on the ball, coughed up possession and then a decent strike bobbled in front of Wickens and went in off the post. It wasn’t really what the home side deserved, and it came at a bad time for us. We could have turned that crowd, another quiet home support on edge whenever we went forward. Just like Rotherham, all it needed was for us to keep pressing and the atmosphere would have changed.
Sadly, that went out the window when we lost Erhahon. From that point on, this game was over. I firmly believe, without a shadow of a doubt, had we come out with equal numbers in the second half, we could have taken a point. They were still edgy and all it needed was for us to come out with a bit of purpose, perhaps shuffle things about on 55 minutes to get Moylan or Bayliss on, and who knows? For all their possession, the 11 men of Bolton still only managed three shots on target in the second half, and two of those went in. They’re a decent side, but the second-half numerical advantage made them look better than they were. This isn’t bitter, but with ten men, there’s no way that finishes 3-0. However, our second-half performance meant it could have easily been 5-0, and certainly would have been against the league’s more coherent sides.
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