Cheltenham Town vs Bolton Wanderers match preview

 The first test, away from home

Bolton Wanderers visit Whaddon Road, otherwise known as The Completely-Suzuki Stadium, in their first away game of the season against Cheltenham Town FC. On Saturday at 3pm, the second fixture of League One will take place and Bolton will look to continue their good form and make it three wins in a row in competitive competitions. 

Bolton Wanderers team news 

George Johnston remains unavailable and will likely miss the entire season, in contrast, Eoin Toal is on the comeback and hasn't been selected recently due to not being sharp. He may be embedded back into the first team soon but this game could come too soon to make the match squad. Jon Dadi Bodvarsson could also return soon with Evatt saying "He is still training with the group".

After picking a heavily rotated side in the cup, there will likely be wholesale changes against Cheltenham Town FC. Coleman will more than likely return to the bench and Nathan Baxter should come back in to the starting line-up, after sitting out the last game. Despite scoring, I expect Zach Ashworth to return to the bench and the in-form Randell Williams should come back to the starting team at left wing back. Ricardo Santos is near unreplaceable at the moment and Jack Iredale seems to have nailed down the left centre back spot with Johnston out of contention. This does leave the question of Will Forrester or Gethin Jones at right centre back however. I think Evatt will go with the experience of Gethin Jones in this game, despite Forrester impressing against Barrow. Dacres Cogley should continue at right wing back, with no real other options apart from Gethin Jones and potentially Luke Matheson but he is not ready for first team football yet.

In midfield, there were three changes for the game against AFC Barrow, with Paris Maghoma, George Thomason and Carlos Mendes Gomes all coming into the starting side. The standout of these three against Barrow was Maghoma, he ran the game: creating the only big chance of the game, completing all his attempted dribbles, making 4 key passes and all with a 94.1% pass accuracy. However, I do not think he will keep his starting place, despite this great performance. Personally, I believe that Josh Sheehan, Aaron Morley and Kyle Dempsey will all return to the starting eleven and Evatt won't take any risks yet.

Against AFC Barrow, Charles and Adeboyejo were both rested and Dan Nlundulu and Cameron Jerome both came in to replace them. It is unlikely that either of these will keep their place in the starting line-up, if one was to it would be Nlundulu. Cameron Jerome is most likely the fifth choice striker when everybody is fit. 

This is the starting team I think Evatt will go with

Cheltenham Town team news and tactics 

Cheltenham brought in 9 players in the summer transfer window, most notably Luke Southwood (from Reading) and Curtis Davies (from Derby County). However, they have lost 12 players including two star players in Ryan Broom (Fleetwood Town) and Alfie May (Charlton Athletic). They have lined up with a 3421 or 352 this season and they have lost both games, their first to Shrewsbury Town and their second to Birmingham City. 

Cheltenham Town are a team that prefer to play on the counter attack and they are a direct team, that don't want to dominate the ball. This is very different to the ideas of Evatt and should make for a very good encounter. Despite losing to Shrewsbury Town, Cheltenham had 4 more shots (16) and 1 more shot on target (4), implying that their finishing is a weakness. They like to attack down the right hand side, rather than the left or through the middle. Another common theme of their play is long shots, the attackers then follow the shot in and capitalise on the rebound - Bolton defenders will have to be aware of this. A weakness of their play is their defensive structure, after committing people forward on an attack their rest defence can be scattered. This means that the centre backs aren't covering the right areas and can be exposed easily. Switching the ball can easily expose their defence, meaning that Dacres Cogley and Randell Williams will be key in this game. 

Based off this and Evatt's use of positional play, I think Evatt's tactics will work well against Cheltenham Town. I am predicting a 3-1 victory for Bolton Wanderers on Saturday: Dempsey (21), Williams (44), Street (51) and Charles (76).