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It might only be February – but Nat Ogbeta is already contemplating the big switch-on at Blackpool.
Wanderers have made life more difficult for themselves by conceding early goals in three of their last five games, a habit the wing-back hopes can be left behind when they turn up at Bloomfield Road.
It will be several months before a famous face illuminates the Golden Mile – and down the years the job has been done by everyone from the Bee Gees ad Gracie Fields to The Muppets and Red Rum.
But wing-back Ogbeta hopes Bolton will make a much brighter start to Saturday’s game than they did against Barnsley, Northampton or Cambridge.
“Honestly, it is really frustrating when you concede early,” he told The Bolton News. “But it will come together.
“I think every team is trying to destruct what we are doing at the minute.
“We have to focus better from minute one. We know we can play at a high level and dominate games but you have to earn the right. It doesn’t mean you can walk up to games and expect everything to happen for us.
“From the start we have to be better but there have been some alarm bells now and I think we’ll get it right.
“We’re playing in some big away games now and if you let the crowd get on their side it makes it more difficult. If we can disturb that momentum and score first, then it is going to be our game to control.
“We have to start quicker and implement our game faster, and I genuinely think that’s what we’ll do.”
Wanderers have the best record in League One after scoring the first goal – averaging 2.62 points per game – but that average drops to just one point per game if the opposition score first, which has happened 10 times, ranking them fifth in the division.
Four teams – Derby, Barnsley, Peterborough and Portsmouth – have been more resilient in that respect but interestingly Bolton’s next two opponents, Blackpool and Wigan, have an especially poor record when conceding first.
Blackpool have recovered just five points from the 13 occasions in which they have conceded first, with Wigan managing six.
Ogbeta feels that passing the aerial test at Cambridge on Tuesday – albeit having to do so from a goal down – will give the Whites a fresh injection of confidence.
“Everyone wants to play the pretty stuff on the ground but those are the sort of games that test your mental character,” he said. “The lads rose to the challenge and it is difficult, it is horrible, it is relentless, but at the end of the day it is what it takes to win a league.
“We are not going to have it all our own way. It isn’t going to be easy.
“But when you find a way through a game like that it unlocks like a new level of belief. I really hope we can use that now to push for the next couple of games that are coming up.”
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