English Premier League – Match Preview: Bolton Wanderers versus Stoke City
Bolton Wanderer’s will be looking to get their season back on track as they host the in-form Stoke City team at the Reebok Stadium on 16th of October, 2010.
Bolton’s start to the English league season has been quite irregular to say the least, sometimes they have struggled to even matchup the teams in the bottom half of the table but on other occasions they have given the likes of Manchester United, a run for
their money.
Currently, 12th in the English league standings after just obtaining eight points from seven matches, Owen Coyle’s team has been quite disappointing of late. Bolton are winless in their last five league matches, a statistic that says multitudes
as far as the team’s abilities are concerned.
On the other hand, Stoke are unbeaten in their last five matches, not only that the Potters have been on a high run of form, which has seen them rise from the bottom three of the English Premier League table to the top half of the rankings.
Presently, Stoke City occupy the 7th place spot in the Premier League standings, a spot that they have earned due to their striker, Kenwyne Jones’s brilliant run of form.
Bolton hosted Fulham at the Reebok Stadium in their first match of the season but Coyle’s team could not breach what proved to be a resilient Fulham defence as the match ended in an unspectacular goalless draw.
After obtaining only a single point from their opening game, the pressure was on Bolton to make their mark through their second league game of the season against West Ham United at Upton Park. Kevin Davies and co. did themselves proud as they totally outplayed
Avram Grant’s team in London.
Bolton won their second league encounter by a comfortable score line of three goals to one. In their third league matchup, Bolton played Birmingham City at the Reebok Stadium, yet again Owen Coyle couldn’t lead his players to their second win of the season
as Birmingham held Bolton to a two all draw.
Bolton travelled all the way to London again to face Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium in their fourth match of the English Premier League season, Arsene Wenger’s team schooled Bolton in how to play possession football as the match ended with the score line
at four goals to one, in favour of the Gunners.
After getting absolutely hammered by the Gunners, Bolton travelled to Birmingham to face Aston Villa at the Villa Park in their fifth league match of the season, due to a superb performance by Davies and Petrov, the Wanderer’s held the Villains to a one
all draw in the end.
Bolton’s biggest result of the season came against Manchester United at the Reebok stadium in their sixth league encounter of the 2010-2011 season.
After battling away to take a lead in the second half of the match against Sir Alex Ferguson’s team, Bolton almost sneaked away with all three points but Michael Owen was on hand for United to salvage a point from the Reebok Stadium as in the end, the encounter
was settled at two goals each.
Bolton drew their last league match at the Hawthorns Stadium against West Bromwich Albion. Alternatively, Stoke won their last league match against Blackburn Rovers at the Britannia Stadium by only a single goal. Before the win against Rovers, Stoke had
faced Newcastle United in their sixth league match of the season and defeated the Magpies at the Saint James’s Park by two goals to one.
Both the teams will be banking on their strikers to make a mark during the match, Bolton will be relying on Johan Elmander to get another goal to add to his tally of four goals in seven league matches whereas Stoke will be looking towards Kenwyne Jones to
get his fourth league goal of the season as they bid to get their fourth win in a row in the English Premier League.
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