Bolton 1, Wolves 0: Bill Howell's big match verdict and player ratings
You’ve bossed large chunks of the game. You’ve looked solid. Yes, you’ve made mistakes but you’ve deserved something.
And you feel as if you’ve been playing poker with Bonnie and Clyde and they’ve slipped an extra ace into their hand.
Whether it was one up front and five in the middle, or three up top as McCarthy suggested was largely the case here, or two in attack as he deployed for the final 20 minutes is all by the by.
Wolves were the better team but somehow allowed Bolton to create most of the chances.
But McCarthy isn’t bemoaning luck. He’s bemoaning missed chances. Nobody, he says, is putting the ball in the net.
And yet they are playing well enough to catch some of those villains (or points). There are undoubtedly a clutch of weaker teams in the division, smaller criminals in their cell.
But this was a big one to lose. A point would have been a major catch – not season-defining but the outlook would have been so very different. You’d have closed the net on Osama bin Laden, tightened the noose around Charles Manson.
Now you are filled with doubt. Your chief inspector Doyle cannot score, cannot nail a clue although he puts so many hours in. Constables Craddock and Berra often fail to keep the peace.
You’ve whisked in a detective from outta town, Adlene Guedioura, who can at times solve a mystery by himself and at others finds an open window but doesn’t even check for finger prints.
This is Wolves 2010. A fine force built on solid principles and solid foundations. The Bow Street Runners of their day, but on the fringes of the Black Country and not London.
This particular thriller is poised to go to the very last page. There’ll be the naming of the culprit who stabbed the vicar in chapter four of this Agatha Christie novel.
Eleven games to go, 33 villains out there and waiting to be caught. Just a dozen will suffice to allow Wolves an extended stay in the biggest league of them all, where all the points wear tattoos on their necks, where all the points have “left” and “right” on their knuckles.
Defend like they did against Bolton before half-time and they could slide into obscurity. Stand aside like Guedioura did to allow Chung-Yong Lee to skip along the byline and pass to Zat Knight to score and Wolves will fall. The mafia will rule.
But dictate play like Dave Jones, thread your midfielders through the eye of a needle like Doyle, continue to block and play with real heart like Jody Craddock, continue to run with an almost youthful zest like Jarvis and Wolves will remain.
Blackburn, Portsmouth and Sunderland. Three golden nuggets on which to end the season. Stay in the mix until then and Steve Morgan and Jez Moxey can breathe out.
Back in August if you had given McCarthy a league of eight where the top five would survive, and he and every supporter would have taken it.
Portsmouth’s demise has made their chances of glory even greater – two down from seven. And you don’t need Sir Isaac Newton to know the odds are still therefore in their favour.
Using straight mathematics, their chances of going out of the league? Precisely 28.5714286 per cent. Chances of staying in it? Over 71 per cent.
Pompey gone, two more to fall, five strugglers will live again.
Not using maths Burnley and Turf Moor looms large. Hull are still weak.
So many prisoners to bang up, but at some point you’ll need to catch one.
BOLTON (4-4-2): Jaaskelainen; Steinsson, Ricketts, Knight, Robinson; Lee(Weiss,90+3), Muamba, Wilshere (Taylor,82), Holden; Elmander (Klasnic,65), Kevin Davies. Subs: Al Habsi, Riga, Cohen, Andrew O’Brien.
WOLVES(4-3-3):Hahneman; Zubar,Craddock, Berra, Ward; Guedioura (Ebanks-Blake,68), Henry, HJONES; Foley (Keogh,73), Doyle, Jarvis. Subs: Hennessey, Elokobi, Vokes, Milijas,Mancienne.
Referee: A Marriner (West Midlands).
