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Ian Evatt has warned Wanderers they must keep their cool in the heat of tonight’s play-off decider against Barnsley.
More than 22,000 tickets have already been snapped up as Bolton look to book their place at Wembley against either Peterborough United or Oxford United.
The Wanderers boss expects his opponents to throw everything at his side to try and get back into the contest, having lost the first leg at Oakwell 3-1.
And that includes the so-called dark arts, which surfaced in the second half of the game last weekend and may well come into play again tonight.
“We have discussed it and we have to be more disciplined,” he told The Bolton News. “We have to make sure we don’t give them any advantage whatsoever, especially a self-inflicted one.
“I trust the players and their ability to make the right calls. There were one or two little niggly things on Friday and we have to make sure we stay on the right side of the fence with them.”
Eoin Toal was involved in an incident with Barnsley’s Sam Cosgrove – a player with whom he has some history – which earned him a yellow card.
The big striker came off the bench to score his fourth goal of the campaign at Oakwell, and could now come into the team to replace top scorer Devante Cole.
Cosgrove injured Toal in last season’s Papa Johns Trophy final with a reckless challenge that went unpunished on the day and kept the defender out of action for weeks.
Evatt hopes his players can keep their emotions in check if Martin Devaney brings the former Wigan Athletic man into the line-up.
“He’s obviously a physical target man and gives a different problem to the one Devante would give us but I think they have dangerous players all over the pitch. We respect them all,” he said.
“What has gone on in the past is gone. We have moved on from that. We can’t keep discussing what happened in the cup final and what happened to Eoin. We all have to reset.
“Did we like it? Absolutely not. But we have to take care of ourselves, keep our discipline and keep 11 players on the pitch.”
Wanderers won at Barnsley with just 41 per cent possession – their lowest of the season – in what was a very deliberate change of tactics for the first leg.
Evatt explained: “We have had the opportunity to learn from the games there, and some of the big games this season, and felt like in that game we could be a little more pragmatic than we usually are, especially early on. We couldn’t give the opposition a leg-up.
“We managed that opening spell really well. It was everything that I expected. I didn’t expect us to link loads of passes as we usually do because that could have been a threat.
“We’d talked about the 20-minute marker and managing to settle and then start to play some football. You saw that with the opening goal and I was delighted the players managed to flick that switch because it is a difficult thing to do.
“The players executed the gameplan perfectly. Do I want to see more football? More control of possession? Absolutely. But I think Friday showed that we are able to do it both ways.”
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