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Espanyol Preview
By Mark Heys
July 31 2007
Bolton Wanderers play their penultimate pre-season fixture tommorow evening when taking on Spanish La Liga outfit and 2007 UEFA Cup finalists Espanyol at the Reebok Stadium in a game which also coincides with the annual family fun day.

The game will be the last at the Reebok before the Premiership curtain raiser against Newcastle United in just under a fortnight from now and Wanderers manager Sammy Lee beleives mixing the type of team his side faces in pre-season will ultimately help the team in both their league and cup preparations next term.

It has been a mixed, yet satisfactory summer for the Trotters so far, there has been little happening on the departure front and ten new arrivals have joined the club since the end of the last season.

Three wins, two defeats and one draw has been the way Bolton's pre-season report has read and the matches against Espanyol and Championship side Colchester United will round off the summer nicely.

Missing for the Wanderers for tommorow nights game will be Stelios Giannakopoulos (hernia), Ricardo Gardner (hamstring) and Blerim Dzemaili (knee) but there could be a debut for Swedish international Christian Wilhelmsson after he completed his loan move from FC Nantes last week.

Espanyol manager Ernesto Valverde will more than likely include experienced Spanish international striker Raul Tamudo in his squad as well as the one time Manchester City winger Albert Riera.

DID YOU KNOW?

Japanese striker Akinori Nishizawa had a mediocre loan spell with Espanyol in 2000. A year later the same thing happened during a six month stay with Bolton.

 

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