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Jack Iredale will get a chance to show what he can do at wingback in Wanderers’ pre-season.
Ian Evatt has been pleased with the way his new signing has settled this summer, playing him exclusively as a left-sided centre-half to date.
But the Bolton boss believes there will be opponents where the Australian defender will be better suited to playing in a wider position, and will be used in favour of Declan John.
“At the moment we’re just trying to embed Jack with our identity, but what I will say is that I think he can play wing-back and we will see him play wing-back in pre-season and he’ll get a feel for how that feels and sits and what’s required from that position,” he said.
“As we progress now in pre-season he will start to play there and see how he copes with that. The reason we bought Jack is because he gives us some real flexibility of moving from position to position and not losing any real quality.
“He’ll be a different type of wing-back to Declan, but sometimes in this division as we know when you go away from home, you’re going to face different challenges and it might be that we need a more physical and more defensive minded player in that left wing-back position, so Jack is definitely that and not necessarily losing much quality going the other way.”
Evatt had Iredale on his radar for much of last season, with a deal completed a matter of days after the final game.
The 26-year-old’s ability to switch between positions could make him a useful addition but Evatt has also been encouraged by the emergence of academy left-back, Max Conway, who has been used as an alternative to John in the last few friendlies.
“We were speaking about Jack and identified him early on last season and monitored the situation and then pushed the button when required,” he said.
“We also have huge belief in Max Conway. We think for a young player he’s got a real chance, we think he’s got a long way to go before he gets to be a first team regular for us, but we see the raw materials there and the potential.
“We want to create and build our own assets and we think Max is one of those.”
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