Coyle suffers a miserable return

Burnley 1 Bolton 0:OWEN COYLE endured a miserable return to Burnley as Wade Elliott's first-half goal sent his Bolton charges crashing out of the League Cup.

On his first appearance back at Turf Moor since making the controversial switch across Lancashire in January, Coyle was demonised from first minute to last.

More importantly, his team lost as well, courtesy of the man whose goal at Wembley took Burnley – and Coyle – into the Premier League 17 short months ago.

The latest crucial Elliott strike was an acrobatic volley a minute before the break after the Bolton defence had got itself into a mess trying to snuff out the danger from a cross by man-of-the-match Chris Eagles that both Jack Cork and Chris Iwelumo tried to convert.

It left Coyle to take a long, lonely walk back to the visitors’ dressingrooms, the boos ringing in his ears, just as they had done a couple of hours earlier when he had emerged.

Burnley nearly got off to a flying start. Eagles brought an excellent save out of Adam Bogdan and then blasted an angled drive against the post in the opening couple of minutes.

The best move of the night should have received an appropriate reward when Bolton’s Rodrigo Moreno and Ivan Klasnic combined superbly to release Tamir Cohen. With enough time to check inside and steady himself, it seemed certain Cohen would equalise. Instead he drilled a poor effort into the side-netting.

BURNLEY: Grant, Mears, Carlisle, Bikey, Fox, Cork, Alexander, Elliott, Rodriguez (Marney 88), Iwelumo (Thompson 75), Eagles (Paterson 83). Subs not used: Jensen, Duff, Cort, Easton. Booked: Marney. Goals: Elliott 45.

BOLTON: Bogdan, Steinsson, Ricketts, Knight, Alonso, Blake, Mark Davies, Cohen, Taylor, Klasnic (Elmander 73), Moreno (Lee 73). Subs not used: Lainton, Robinson, Muamba, Holden, Petrov. Booked: Cohen, Mark Davies.

Referee: Mark Clattenburg (England).