'Risky business' - Wanderers considering change in January transfer course

Wanderers could be forced into a transfer re-think after learning that Will Forrester could be out of action until the end of February.

Ian Evatt confirmed his defender had suffered a grade 2B tear of his hamstring in the FA Cup third round against Luton Town, which leaves him down to three fit senior central defenders.

Jack Iredale is likely to come in against Leyton Orient – if the match is given the go-ahead – with Eoin Toal shifted to the right side of Ricardo Santos.

But beyond that, Evatt has little cover, and with Gethin Jones away on international duty with Australia at the Asian Cup in Qatar that is unlikely to change in the next few weeks.

Asked if Forrester’s injury will change his plans for the remainder of the January window, Ian Evatt said: “Probably. We haven’t made a final decision on that but I will have a conversation with Chris (Markham) and then come up with the plan.

“Obviously being in the middle of this window helps but it was also the one where Gethin would be away. Our biggest fear was losing either Cogs or Will during this period because we don’t really have the cover. It would be very risky to continue without having that.

“We will see what is available, we will go through our target list, which we have for every position and then make a call.

“It may change things and it is something we need to have deep discussions on.”

Wanderers are waiting to see the results of a lunchtime pitch inspection at Brisbane Road to see whether Saturday’s League One game is given the go-ahead, but also face further inspections tomorrow morning if the temperatures remain low.

As things stand, Bolton play Saturday-Tuesday each week until February 17 but Evatt refuses to consider the backlog of fixtures a problem.

“It is absolutely not a bad thing,” he said. “We will embrace it, we will enjoy it.

“I think this team is still improving and has lots to offer. We have to take that performance we gave against a Premier League team in Luton Town and replicate it as many times as we can between now and the end of the season. If we can do that I have no doubt we will achieve our ambitions.”

Source

Well who would have thought another injury to a small squad, further depleted with two players away on international duty for weeks and two already with long term injury's, could possibly have happened playing a meaningless an unnecessary cup game?

Sluffy wrote:Personally I even think we'd be better off out of the cups (this one and the mickey mouse one we won last season) if we are deadly serious of getting automatic promotion - why play extra, tiring games, risk injuries, fatigue and suspensions when you don't have to do so...

We now are in the position of having key players like Santos and Toal having to play two games a week for for the foreseeable future and risk them being burnt out or injured.

Not the best planning to do all we can to maintain our promotion push for the remaining half of the season really is it?

We could definitely do with another CB now, probably be a loan though as once they are all fit we may be overloaded in that area. I suppose we weren't expecting Jones to get called up by the Aussies and it did seem to happen quite last minute.

I wouldn't be too bothered either if we went out of the BSM cup as well.

Norpig wrote:We could definitely do with another CB now, probably be a loan though as once they are all fit we may be overloaded in that area. I suppose we weren't expecting Jones to get called up by the Aussies and it did seem to happen quite last minute.

I wouldn't be too bothered either if we went out of the BSM cup as well.

I think the club would be aware of Australia scouting him AND Iredale and were obviously aware that Johnson was out for the season.

You didn't have to be as smart as Einstein to know we were a bit light there and vulnerable not only to injury and/or suspension but to player burn out even if we got through the international call up weeks, with or without injury's or sending offs.

(Note the player burn out will accumulate and kick in towards the latter end of the season, when we will need it the least).

Of course we had to play in the cups but my point was to keep our key players out of the team - what point is having the reserve team players if we don't play them when needed for cover in games like this???

We didn't need to win these cup games but compete in them.

Anyway what is done, is done.