When was the last time one could equate Bolton with terms like beautiful or bountiful?
The conventional answer is probably not a while. A more accurate claim could be 2006, the last time— and only the second time in club history— Bolton were in European competition.
Yet perhaps the best answer lies in a staggering statistic that came into play following Bolton’s 5-1 thrashing of Newcastle on Saturday: the result marked the first time the Wanderers had scored four goals in consecutive home matches since 1958.
52 years for those not counting; that’s staggering.
Though this season is shaping up to be one of the most unpredictable— if not preposterous— ones in Premier League history, Bolton’s recent upswing in form is no coincidence. Rather, it’s the reaping of Owen Coyle’s revolution that began at the Reebok last season.
Coyle— the attack-minded former striker who played for Bolton between 1993 and 1995— scored an impressive 300 goals in over 700 career games; certainly, his management philosophies seem to mirror that prolific display of offensiveness.
At Burnley, Coyle took a Clarets side with a seeming glass table at the mid-table and molded them into one of the Championship’s most expansive sides.
Then, after taking over for Gary Megson— who was doomed at the Reebok before he started with the fans’ firmly planted lack of approval— Coyle was faced with naturalizing a team that had been viewed as employing a style of play that had long strayed too far from modern expectations of entertaining athletics.
The apprehension that comes from long ball, hoof tactics teams centers on the style of play’s diminishment of ‘pass and move’, and quite often the midfield. This, by all accounts, appears to be the thing Coyle set out to straighten most in the summer after retaining Premier League status with a steady-the-ship, 14th placed finish.
And he did it the two ways managers must: through improving what he already had while also shrewdly adding to it. The emergence of South Korean international Chung-Yong Lee is a fantastic example of the former.
Without a fluid passing midfield, a possession oriented player like Lee floundered for Bolton in 2009, highlighted to an extent in the chalkboard (below) from the team’s game against Tottenham last season. In the game, Lee makes a mere 16 passes, not discounting the four unsuccessful ones, and a quarter of them are in his own defensive third. He attempted only five passes in the midfield zone, an extremely low rate for any midfield player of any kind.
Compare that to this season.
Improved and renewed in a more possession oriented style of play that utilizes the ground more than the air in passing, Lee has been sensational in spurts. In this season’s corresponding fixture against Tottenham, the five-foot-11-inch winger nearly doubled his amount of pass attempts to a much more reasonable 28 (23 of which were successful).
This time, all but a few passes are from the midfield stripe forward and the right side of midfield; a spot that Lee has hugged to some success. So far this season, Lee has a team-leading five assists to go along with two goals.
Another one of his midfield compatriots contributing to Bolton’s ascent is American Stuart Holden, who came to the team from the Houston Dynamo. After working his way into the starting lineup, he’s now contributed a goal and a assist to a team now flying in fifth place. There’s also Manchester City exile Martin Petrov, who is just the all out attack-minded player perfect for a team seeking to pep up its style of play.
Of course, this is all before getting to Bolton’s strikers, who have been as improved as anybody, if not more. Kevin Davies, whose been improved enough to earn his first England call up, and Swedish international Johan Elmander have formulated a troublesome tandem up top. Their combined 14 goals so far this season is the second most of any duo in the league.
Bolton’s time near the toast of the table may not last the whole season, but their improved attitude towards the game should. If results thus far are anything to go by, the Wanderers wondrous results should roll on.
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