Marked for Estevão Spencer
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad9 Apr 2029
Tomáš Koubek was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Market9 Apr 2029
He left as a boy and has come back still knowing where the away end is. Most signings have to be explained to a town; this one needed a photograph and nothing else.
Squad9 Apr 2029
The manager makes an example of Jakub Elbel
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Market9 Apr 2029
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Lukáš Letenay’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
Squad9 Apr 2029
Šimon Gabriel has company in his position
The competition arrived without a word said to him about it. Šimon Gabriel keeps the shirt for now, at Slovan Liberec's convenience rather than his own.
Squad9 Apr 2029
Leandro Carvalho asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match30 Sep 2028
15 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Squad2 Oct 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bolton Wanderers this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad2 Oct 2028
The manager makes an example of George Johnston
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Player ratings2 Oct 2028
Successful dribbles: 17. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad2 Oct 2028
The medical room confirms 15 days on the sidelines for Miguel Rojas, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
Match30 Sep 2028
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
Squad2 Oct 2028
The captaincy has been taken off Rúben Rodrigues. Bolton Wanderers will call it a decision about the team; a dressing room reads it as a verdict on a man.
Market2 Oct 2028
Contract settled, hands shaken, no fee changing hands. Rayan Souici leaves Bolton Wanderers the quiet way, and the wage bill breathes a little easier.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match9 Sep 2028
The run now stands at 11, and the questions being asked around Bolton Wanderers are no longer polite ones.
Squad11 Sep 2028
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Bolton Wanderers may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad11 Sep 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bolton Wanderers this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings11 Sep 2028
A performance of 8.67 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Player ratings11 Sep 2028
Marked 8.35 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Squad11 Sep 2028
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Richard Taylor commits to Bolton Wanderers for another 4 years.
Player ratings11 Sep 2028
A performance of 8.10 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Match9 Sep 2028
It finished 4‑4, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
Squad11 Sep 2028
The manager makes an example of Callum Guy
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.