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Ian Evatt has thanked Burton Albion and Cheltenham Town for helping to ease Wanderers’ fixture pile-up.
Following the abandonment of last weekend’s home game against the Robins, the club was able to move quickly to reschedule the match – with the help of a few favours.
Burton had been due to host Cheltenham on Tuesday night (January 23) but after Bolton’s attempts to move games against Shrewsbury and Blackpool failed, they were able to broker a deal with the EFL to move their own game to later in the season.
Being able to fill a midweek slot at such short notice was a big boost, says Evatt, whose side have very little wiggle room to move games for the rest of the campaign.
“It helps us and I have to say a huge, massive thank you to Patto (Martin Patterson) and to Darrell (Clarke) for making it happen,” he told The Bolton News.
“Both clubs have been very gracious, very respectful, and done what they can to help us with our fixture congestion. It is great credit to both those clubs, and we thank them very much.
“It certainly does help because nobody wants the number of games in hand we could end up with, and that running into March and April when the games are just going to be relentless.
“To get another one in quickly is fantastic so credit to Richard Cooper too for getting that done.”
Last weekend’s game was level at 0-0, with Wanderers making a slow start before events off the pitch took precedence.
They returned to face Luton Town in an FA Cup third round replay and acquitted themselves well, leaving Evatt confident as his side go into the game against Leyton Orient this afternoon.
“I think we are playing well,” he said. “Games ebb and flow and I think at the start of the game on Saturday we were still trying to work it out, which sometimes happens. I do believe we would have found those solutions as well.
“What happened was tragic and we immediately stopped thinking about football.
“For Luton I’d challenged the players to play better than we had down there, and I think we managed to do that. We didn’t get the result, that happens, but we need to trust the process and make sure we get to that performance level again. If we do, there will be a lot of League One clubs that struggle to contain us.”
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