Nottingham Forest ripped Bolton Wanderers’ plans to pieces but Trotters were eventually thankful | OneFootball

Late sale of Zach Clough to Nottingham Forest threatened to ruin Bolton Wanderers' season but instead sparked them build a promotion-winning squad.

In January 2017, Bolton Wanderers were firmly in the fight for a top-two finish and automatic promotion from League One, led by Phil Parkinson in what was their first season outside the top two divisions in over 30 years.

Bolton had stumbled heading into the winter market and failed to win any of their three games in the month of January – including back-to-back 2-1 defeats at home to Swindon Town and then Charlton Athletic.

The latter of those two defeats saw Zach Clough give Bolton the lead after 13 minutes with an excellent free-kick before the Addicks’ turnaround. Little did Bolton fans know that, Clough’s ninth league goal in just 23 appearances in a low-scoring side, would be his final goal in his final appearance that season.

Just before the deadline, Clough moved to Championship side Nottingham Forest for a fee believed to be in the region of £3 million, leaving Parkinson to pick up the pieces and completely reset – but what a reset it would be.

Drama before and after the deadline at Bolton

As well as the departure of Clough, two of Parkinson’s first signings from the previous summer also departed the club before the deadline, with both Jamie Proctor and Chris Taylor leaving for Carlisle United and Oldham Athletic on loan respectively.

With a shake-up underway and incomings desperately needed, Bolton went about their business in a shrewd manner and managed to add three forwards on loan; Chris Long, Viv Solomon-Otabor and, most importantly of all, Adam Le Fondre.

Le Fondre would go on to become not just instrumental but perhaps the most important part of Bolton’s eventual automatic promotion to the second tier – though another man that joined two days after the deadline would rival him for that claim.

After being released by Bradford City, Parkinson’s former player Filipe Morais arrived on a free transfer two days after the window closed and it was his arrival that allowed Bolton to revamp and refocus their efforts.

The pragmatism of Phil Parkinson

For most of the first half of the campaign, Bolton had deployed a 4-2-3-1 system with Clough playing in a pocket to the left-hand side, feeding off knockdowns of Gary Madine.

However, the departure of Clough, as well as loanee Sammy Ameobi returning to parent club Newcastle United earlier in the month, meant Wanderers would have to shift system and that allowed for Le Fondre to strike up an extremely effective partnership with Madine upfront and then the aforementioned Filipe Morais playing as a wing-back in a 3-5-2 system.

With the experience and energy of the likes of Jay Spearing and Josh Vela in midfield, Parkinson had built a steady and well-balanced side that could control most teams and had one of the best set-piece takers in the EFL, Morais, to aim for the giants of David Wheater and Mark Beevers from corners or free-kicks.

Morais would go on to earn himself 14 assists in 23 appearances for Wanderers, including a run of 12 in seven matches as Bolton collected 17 points in those seven games a month or so after arriving.

Le Fondre, on the other hand, notched six goals in 19 appearances with some key promotion-winning strikes to re-establish himself as a fans' favourite having played for the club loan in the 2014/15 season under Neil Lennon.

From the ashes of a potential season-defining sale of their key man with just over 24 hours of the transfer window left, Bolton managed to completely reconstruct themselves and make some heroes out of free transfers and loan deals, propelling themselves back into the second tier on the final day of the campaign with a 3-0 hammering of Peterborough United.