At the start of the season I read a piece from former England manager Terry Venables who tipped Bolton to struggle this season. I couldn’t believe what I was reading. Here was a man who had played at the highest level, managed Barcelona and almost led England to glory at Euro 96. How could he possibly predict a bad season for Owen Coyle’s men following the promising season they had last year. Well, I hold my hands up, maybe El Tel knows best after all.
Since beating newly promoted QPR 4-0 at Loftus Road on the opening day of the season, Bolton have been beaten more times than a disobedient child. Manchester City and Liverpool put three past them, Manchester United made it five without reply, Norwich beat them 2-1 and even Arsenal scored three and kept a clean sheet.
With players like Gary Cahill, Kevin Davies and Martin Petrov in the team, Bolton are not relegation fodder. However, today they prop up the Premier League table, but can they turn things around against title chasing Chelsea this afternoon? It’s highly unlikely.
Chelsea got back to winning ways against Swansea City last weekend and Andre Villa-Boas is starting to put his stamp on the team. Frank Lampard has been resigned to the bench while the pace and industry of Juan Mata and Ramires have given Fernando Torres a real lift. Unfortunately the Spaniard will miss today’s game following his reckless challenge on Swansea’s Mark Gower, but Chelsea have plenty of players capable of getting on the scoresheet.
The Blues made a slow start to life under AVB but they carved the champions open at Old Trafford and should have left Manchester with a share of the spoils at least. This will be their first away game in the league since that eventful encounter and I can’t see them leaving the north west empty-handed again.
Bolton have lost their past five league and cup meetings with Chelsea in a row – conceding 14 goals in the process without hitting the back of the net once - and their last win over Chelsea at home came in 1997, courtesy of Dean Holdsworth. They also haven’t won at home in the league since Tamir Cohen’s late winner against Arsenal in April. Considering the start they have made, the last team they would want to be playing right now is Chelsea. However, football has a funny way of surprising people, but anything other than a Chelsea win would be a real shock.
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