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If Wanderers can add another 30 goals to their tally this season, Ian Evatt is confident they will be in the automatic promotion shake-up.
It has been a red-hot start in front of goal for the Whites, who have won their first two league games by three goals to nil, either side of a narrow triumph against Barrow in the Carabao Cup.
It is 70 years since they have started a season in such fine goalscoring fettle – and Evatt believes a noticeable improvement at set pieces could be one of the main reasons.
“For all our dominance on the ball I think it is really important that we have added that string to our bow,” he said. “I think we have scored four now - our defensive record was excellent last season but we probably needed to score 30 more goals and if we keep chipping away with set pieces we’ll do what we can to fire ourselves up the league.”
Dion Charles scored his first goals of the season at Cheltenham, with Victor Adeboyejo having opened his account the previous weekend.
Evatt was pleased with the strike pair’s display at Whaddon Road.
“Dion’s finishes were clinical,” he said. “Strikers want to get off the mark, get up and running quickly, and he has done that now, just as Victor did the other day.
“I think if they perform like that then the goals will come. Pressing from the front is all about having the right attitude. Some of the combinations and connections, playing into them quickly and having the third man running off them, it all really helped us.
“There was lots to like about the performance.”
Wanderers named an unchanged line-up and were once again able to introduce new signings like Paris Maghoma and Carlos Mendes Gomes from the bench.
“We are only just scratching the surface with those players, I genuinely feel we have only just begun,” Evatt noted.
“This is a hugely talented group but the main thing is that nobody gets carried away. We stay humble and strive for some improvement because that is what matters to me now, we have to step up on Tuesday and do it again.”
Nathan Baxter kept his second successive clean sheet, making his first save in Bolton colours midway through the second half from defender Lewis Freestone’s header.
Having previously had little to do, the keeper’s levels of focus were a pleasing factor for Wanderers boss Evatt.
“If you ask James Trafford about last year it is that kind of performance that is going to be important for us,” he said. “He is not going to be over-worked, or at least I hope he isn’t, because of the type of team we are. But there might be one or two instances in the game where he needs to stay concentrated and to come up with a big save like he did there.”
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