Tottenham Hotspur Preview

By Mark Heys
November 4 2005

Bolton Wanderers will be hoping to keep their fine record against Tottenham Hotspur in tact when the two sides go head-to-head at the Reebok Stadium on Monday evening.

The North London club have not defeated Bolton at the Reebok Stadium in league competition and you have to go back to March 1996 to find a last Spurs away win against the Wanderers.

Martin Jol's side are going well at the moment though and have lost just twice all season with defeats against Premiership champions Chelsea and a shock defeat to Grimsby Town in the Carling Cup.

Bolton too are on a fine run of form and have won their last three matches in all competitions with the last coming during Thursday's UEFA Cup tie against Zenit St Petersburg at a wet Reebok Stadium.

Kevin Nolan has been the matchwinner for three out of Bolton's last four games. The former England U21 midfielder is currently the Trotters top goalscorer with five strikes in all competitions.

Tottenham have recently forced two very good draws against two of the so-called big three teams in the top flight. They held Manchester United at Old Trafford courtesy of a fine Jermaine Jenas free kick whilst arch rivals Arsenal grabbed a late point last weekend after Ledley King had given Spurs a first half lead.

Sam Allardyce could recall El-Hadji Diouf to the starting line up for this game after the Senegal striker was confined to the bench for the Zenit game on Thursday.

Nicky Hunt and Ivan Campo are still a week or so away from full fitness and Khalilou Fadiga is once again on the treatment table as he receives surgery for a troublesome knee problem.

Henrik Pedersen is doubtful with an achillies injury which forced him out of the Wanderers last two games but Martin Djetou is back in contention having been missing for the Zenit game due to ineligability.

Former Spurs goalkeeper Ian Walker is likely to be named amongst the Trotters substitutes bench for this game. Walker played in over 250 games for the London side between 1990 and 2001.

Tottenham manager Martin Jol is still without Wayne Routledge, Anthony Gardner and Goran Bunjevcevic but the trio are responding well to their long term injury problems.

Youngsters Dean Marney and Mounir El Hamdaoui are also added to the injury list having picked up problems whilst loaned out to Norwich City and Derby County respectively.

PREMIERSHIP RECORD

23/12/1995 TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 2 (Sheringham, Armstrong) BOLTON WANDERERS 2 (Green, Bergsson)

20/03/1996 BOLTON WANDERERS 2 (Curcic, Sellars) TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 3 (Howells, Fox, Armstrong)

23/09/1997 BOLTON WANDERERS 1 (Thompson) TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 1 (Armstrong)

01/03/1998 TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 1 (Neilsen) BOLTON WANDERERS 0

03/12/2001 TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 3 (Poyet, Ferdinand, Sheringham) BOLTON WANDERERS 2 (Ricketts, Wallace)

20/04/2002 BOLTON WANDERERS 1 (Holdsworth) TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 1 (Iversen)

20/10/2002 TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 3 (Keane 2, Davies) BOLTON WANDERERS 1 (Djorkaeff)

24/03/2003 BOLTON WANDERERS 1 (Okocha) TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 0

01/11/2003 TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 0 BOLTON WANDERERS 1 (Nolan)

17/04/2004 BOLTON WANDERERS 2 (Campo, Pedersen) TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 0

23/10/2004 TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 1 (Keane) BOLTON WANDERERS 2 (Jaidi, Pedersen)

01/02/2005 BOLTON WANDERERS 3 (Diouf, Ben-Haim, Davies) TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 1 (Defoe)

PREMIERSHIP FORM GUIDE:

Played: 12

Won: 5

Drawn: 3

Lost: 4

CONNECTIONS

Chris Armstrong, Gudni Bergsson, Chris Fairclough, Les Ferdinand, George Hunt, Don McAllister, Neil McNab, Ian Moores, Ian Walker.

IT HAPPENED WHEN BOLTON PLAYED THE ADDICKS

Spurs became the first opposing team to score at the Reebok Stadium when future Wanderer Chris Armstrong planted a header past Keith Branagan in the Premiership match between Bolton and Tottenham in September 1997.

In November 2003 Jay-Jay Okocha hit the Tottenham woodwork five times in an excellent individual performance. Despite this, the Nigerian could not score a league goal throughout that campaign.

Ex-Spur Gudni Bergsson gained Bolton a valuable point when he struck a late equaliser in the 2-2 draw at White Hart Lane ten years ago. Spurs had seemingly been cruising thanks to goals from Armstrong and Teddy Sheringham but Scott Green of Bolton set up a nervous finish prior to Bergsson's leveller from the edge of the area past current Wanderer Ian Walker.