Where's the tough month?

Remember last New Year? Liverpool and Arsenal away and Stretford at home in the space of four games. Nothing like that this time. Where will his excuse for a tough month come from, unless you think December will be a killer?

Player in not very good Sam Allardyce signing shock!!

When Blerim Džemaili signed for Bolton in the winter of 2006-2007, Big Sam Allardyce said the following.

"Džemaili is a fantastic player, who has played for the best team in Switzerland for the past three years. For someone so young, he has a wealth of experience. At the tender age of 20, he is the skipper of FC Zurich and is expected to become a regular international for Switzerland in the years ahead. He has hardly missed a game for FC Zurich since he started playing for them at the age of 17. I am excited by the prospect of working with Blerim next season".

Oh.Very.Dear. The next season saw Big Sam ensconsed at Newcastle and the new signing suffering an injury before he even arrived. One game, the FA Cup tie between Bolton Wanderers Reserves and Sheffield United Reserves in January 2008, and two managers later, Blerim was shipped off to a loan deal with Torino, who immediately managed to get themselves relegated, although whether these two outcomes are related is up for debate.

What is probably not up for debate is that sometimes the rose tinted spectacles of Big Sam's time at the club have to come off. Some shocking decisions in signings (Mario Jardel anyone?) may, and I say may in its loosest possible context, have been part of the reason why Gill Fartslime didn't release more funds to the manager, hastening his departure. At the same time as he signed Džemaili, Gerald Cid also made his way to the club. Add in Ibrahim Ba and you have a motley crew of players brought in by Bolton's favourite adopted son who make some of Sammy Lee's signings look positively inspired. Still doesn't explain why Mr Fartslime is bankrolling the Ginger Special One to the extent that he is though.

Good buy, good look, good riddance.

See, it's not just the Bolton website that can come up with a play on words.
Starting with the good riddance, it has come as a shock but a purely pleasant one that myopic, can't run properly, looks like Terry out of Emmerdale referee Rob Styles has decided to hang his whistle and cards in. His penalty decision at Trafford Park last season even had the Ginger Special One and Bolton fans agreeing, although that didn't last long, obviously. Here at X Towers we agree that referees have a hard time (I actually passed the ref's course but have never taken a match, preferring my limbs where they are thank you) but when even the Madrid bound Paris lover doesn't appeal, you know it's time to go. Apparently he's only 45. I didn't realise cataracts could become a problem that young. A Ho-Ho-Ho.

Now a good look at the transfer targets that Bolton are allegedly in for other than Miguel Velozzzzzzzzzo (this also covers the 'buy' of the title). The Express have reported that the club are renewing their interest in Sean Davis. Here at the Towers we are giving this a cautious 7/10. Bolton seriously need a central midfielder to replace Gavin McCann and Davis is as good as any. Bear in mind though that a lot of people fall into this category, ranging from Ronaldo to Lazarus, but he seems to have worked well with Matty Taylor while at Portsmouth, and we'll get him for nowt.
The Independent report that Moumouni Dagano is a target. Errr...me neither. We give this an X probability of 2/10. Sounds very like someone's agent talking them up.
And that's it. Here at the Towers we don't bother with goal.com or anyone like that, you may as well make up your own rumour than reading that.

In other news, the hair that is Ivan Campo has managed to pick up a parking ticket for having windows too heavily tinted in Ipswich. Now surely he was trying to not look out of the windows rather than stopping people looking in. We all know what Suffolk's like.

Our friend's over at Soccerlens have posted their thoughts on who will be the first manager out of the door next season. The Ginger Special One has come in as being as vulnerable as Mick McCarthy. Now, bearing in mind that the only people more vulnerable are Suntan Phil and Sparky maybe we're all going to get what we want for Christmas.

Over the next few weeks we'll be looking at what former Bolton players that are still kicking a ball around have been doing this past season, although we all know that Anelka and Eidur have picked up a couple of medals. Apparently Vincent Candela had some sort of Ben Hur situation at his retirement game. All Jussi is getting at his testimonial is Hibs.

And finally......the Michael Ricketts watch this week sees the striker who manages to put more weight on in pre season training weighing into the current financial situation at the Jamaican Football Federation.

The Bolton News Bolton Wanderers Page, Giving You All The News About Bolton Wanderers

Probably due to paucity of what comes out The Reebok during the summer, The Bolton News today give us a story on a world record transfer fee on the Bolton Wanderers page. Good work fellas, but what has this got to do with us? Do you not think that we watch/read the news? And are you expecting Messrs Gill, Ferguson, Ronaldo or Pérez to give a quote to your paper? And me sideways looking at this story is larger than the story on the website. Waste of time?
Also, in the most rhetorical survey this side of "was Danny Shittu a quality purchase?", they are asking if Bolton should change their style of play. Quoting the Ginger Special One, in an interview of bleeding obviousness Miguel Velozzzzzzzzzzzzz...........(sorry, fell asleep there) Miguel Veloso is mentioned for the thousandth time as someone that he would like to bring in and then there's......er....hang on while I look under this metaphorical newspaper to see if there is anyone else's name hiding in the article......sorry, that's it. So we can expect summer signings to surpass last summers. And if I hear Leroy Lita's name one more time.............
On the website they have a headline of "New Kit on the Block". Have you seen what they've done there?

Grass? That's dope man.

In news I, and any right thinking person, could care less about, Bolton are putting a new pitch in. No, not in for a player, an actual new pitch. Surely they should be putting new air in, seeing as how that was where the ball spent most of last season. But wait, according to the captain, this could herald a new type of game, known as "football".

So much to catch up on.....

Partly due to the Brothers Gallagher coming on slightly late on Thursday, thereby making it impossible to update anything on Thursday, and then myself and Mrs X being on the road since then, mostly back into Wi-Fi? WTF? country, this is the first update of the week. And when they tried to go back on their ticket refund offer it proved the following moral. Never trust a Citeh fan, especially when he is being backed up by his Citeh supporting brother.

So.....Gary, unsuprisingly, didn't get onto the bench on Saturday. Also unsurpisingly, Matthew Upson didn't cover himself in glory on Saturday. Mystic X predicts that Gary will not be on the bench on Wednesday. We are offering odds of 1-30. DO NOT send money.

Nothing much to say about the Bolton website and the last news that was on the Bolton page on the BBC is..................Manchester City 1 - 0 Bolton. For God's sake, does no news worthwhile bothering the BBC ever come out of the Reebok? I keep on expecting to see newsreel of Nat bundling Harry Gregg into the net to pop up there.

And while we are talking about news on the website, while we get this..... ...to advertise our new home kit, Liverpool fans get this.........to advertise their away kit. I'm not one to go in for this "scouse humour" balls, unless it's a lack of one, but this is quite good.

In other news, the now officially titled "MICHAEL RICKETTS WATCH" finds the former Bolton ace hitman has been sent down for a year. Let's hope Mr Cahill doesn't go the same way in seven years. That's Gary, not Tim who we all know is Australian and has it in his genes.

Shurley Shum Mishtake?

SEPERATED AT BIRTH?


In the latest news coming out of the FA, Fabio Capello has been put in a padded room with a stiff drink and a tonne of valium as it turns out that he thought he was calling up Tim Cahill.