Bolton have made a poor start to the Championship season and this has increased the pressure on the manager Dougie Freedman. There has been a lot of speculation that Freedman could be relieved of his duties before this weekend, but the manager has confirmed that he will be staying in charge. Bolton have made one of the worst starts to a season after managing to not win any of the opening seven matches. As a result, they are rooted to the bottom of the table. At the start of the campaign, they were expected to be one of the challengers for at least a play-off place.

Now, avoiding relegation will be the key for Bolton as they were only recently relegated from the Premier league. One of the major problems for Freedman has been lack of any transfer money, but he is remaining confident that the club will be able to put a promotion challenge from this position. Bolton became an established Premier league club under the regime of Sam Allardyce, but the club has since fallen back into the bottom divisions of English football. Another relegation would be disastrous for the club primarily in the financial sense.

Freedman has said that he has seen enough from training to suggest that the form will improve.

“I see a different attitude with the fans right now and that is why I am trying to talk them through what we are trying to do and where this football club is at. This is their club and right now it is going through a period that it hasn’t had to face for 10, 11, 12 years while they were in the Premier League. There isn’t a magic formula. We have to slowly turn things around and concentrate on the future. And I don’t think we are a million miles away – that is me speaking straight from the heart,” said Freedman.