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The driving rain, the sound of 2,000-plus unhappy away fans and an injury-hit team beaten by a solitary goal – all memories that Ian Evatt would happily put behind him at Accrington Stanley this weekend.
For the Bolton boss, last December’s dismal defeat at the Crown Ground was one of the lowest points of a managerial reign which stands at 841 days and counting.
Wanderers – then missing key men like Ricardo Santos, Gethin Jones, Josh Sheehan and Lloyd Isgrove and reeling from a 3-0 defeat at Fleetwood – were dropping down the League One table fast.
In stark comparison, they make this weekend’s short hop across Lancashire in seventh spot, and despite failing to score in their last three outings, could still climb as high as fourth with a win.
If Bolton do take three points from the Crown Ground, it would be a first, and for Evatt, a chance to show his team has progressed from that dismal December evening.
“It was horrible last year, in fact since I have been manager of Bolton Wanderers that has probably been one of my worst experiences,” he told The Bolton News.
“Going there with less than half a team, still creating and feeling we should have got something out of the game but losing 1-0 and letting our fans down, and they let us know about it. It was horrible, there was no denying it.
“We have come a long way since that point. We have evolved as a team, and it would be great to go there and show what we can do.
“Historically, the last few times we have been there we haven’t done ourselves justice so let’s go and show what we can do.”
There will be expectation in a sell-out away end that Wanderers will also show more of a cutting edge in front of goal than they managed in their previous three games.
While Evatt has been pleased with many aspects of his team’s performance, and indeed the number of goalscoring opportunities they are creating, their lack of ruthlessness has been much discussed.
The Bolton boss knows full well his job – particularly with the Whites playing third-tier football – will always carry with it an extra level of pressure to perform.
“I am not sitting here and saying we are hard done by, because we are absolutely not,” he said. “But we are working really hard to get this club back to where we believe it should be, and there is a process behind that.
“There will be bad days – Cheltenham and Forest Green being prime examples – but there will also be good ones and we would like to feel like we have given the fans quite a number of those in recent years. Hopefully we go to Accrington and really give a good account of ourselves.
“I genuinely don’t feel like we are far away, I think 85-90 per cent there.
“It is just that last 10 per cent at the top end of the pitch – and it isn’t the system, it isn’t a lack of creativity, all those things are happening.
“This is the same group of strikers and, if anything, we have layered in detail and they have improved.
“We understand we have had a few shy games but that doesn’t make us a bad team or prove that things are going the other way.
“Everyone said last season we couldn’t defend but we could score for fun, now we can defend but we can’t score. It’s football and everyone has an opinion but amongst all that we have to keep some clarity of vision and hope the direction we are heading in is the right one.”
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