By Mark Heys
September 23 2005

Bolton will be hoping to continue their five game unbeaten run at the Reebok Stadium tommorow afternoon as they face a Portsmouth side who are down on their luck at the moment having been dumped out of the Carling Cup by Gillingham in midweek.

Pompey have won just once in the Premiership this season and are struggling to find any consistency so a trip to the in-form Wanderers is the last thing that coach Alain Perrin had in mind when thinking of a possible revival.

The giant-killing act by the Gills forced Portsmouth fans to question whether or not Perrin was the right man for the job, but the South Coast club can take heart by the fact that Bolton have won just once against them in four Premiership meetings, this coming in January 2004 when a solitary Kevin Davies goal seperated the two sides at the Reebok.

Wanderers have a number of injury concerns for this game but a definate absentee is that of Spanish midfielder Ivan Campo who broke his foot in training earlier this week.

African trio Radhi Jaidi (hamstring), Jay-Jay Okocha (ankle) and Abdoulaye Diagne-Faye (groin) have also been struggling to shake off recent knocks whilst ex-Southampton winger Fabrice Fernandes has been carrying a hamstring injury following an excellent debut showing in the UEFA Cup tie with Lokomotiv Plovdiv.

Ricardo Gardner and Henrik Pedersen are once again expected to rotate their roles down the left hand side having used the tactic to good effect in the latter stages of the City game.

Japanese star Hidetoshi Nakata may also come more into the reckoning following an encouraging substitute appearance at the City of Manchester Stadium in the last game.

Pompey boss Perrin has concerns of his own as Linvoy Primus, Aliou Cisse and Zvonimir Vukic are all ruled out with injury but ex-Newcastle duo Lomano Lua-Lua and Laurent Robert may return after missing Tuesday's shock at the Preistfield Stadium.

PREMIERSHIP RECORD

26/08/2003 PORTSMOUTH 4 (Stone, Sheringham 3) BOLTON WANDERERS 0

17/01/2004 BOLTON WANDERERS 1 (Davies) PORTSMOUTH 0

27/11/2004 BOLTON WANDERERS 0 PORTSMOUTH 1 (De Zeeuw)

07/05/2005 PORTSMOUTH 1 (Yakubu) BOLTON WANDERERS 1 (Diouf)

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PREMIERSHIP FORM GUIDE:

Played: 4

Won: 1

Drawn: 1

Lost: 2

CONNECTIONS

Brian Bromley, John Gregory, Trevor Hebbard, Russell Hoult, Paul Ritchie

IT HAPPENED WHEN BOLTON PLAYED POMPEY

Ex-Manchester United and England striker Teddy Sheringham scored a hat-trick against Bolton in the first Premiership meetings between these two sides back in August 2003.

Bolton's El-Hadji Diouf was banned for three matches after last season's fixture due to spitting at opponent Arjan De Zeeuw who is now back at Wigan Athletic.