It is safe to assume George Burley will wake this morning to discover his car has been stolen and his house burgled. As if a defeat which kept his side second from bottom of the Premiership was not bad enough, Ipswich's manager saw injury added to insult over the weekend.
On Saturday his leading scorer, Marcus Stewart, fractured his jaw in a training-ground accident and will be out for eight weeks. Yesterday, Burley watched new signing Ulrich le Pen taken off on a stretcher with a badly gashed foot 13 minutes after coming on for his debut.
"He needed eight or nine stitches," Burley said. "It could be four weeks he's out for." Burley's worries are mounting. Finidi George and Alun Armstrong are also injured. Worse still, any hopes of signing the Turkey striker Hakan Sukur on loan from Inter have fallen through.
Entertaining Internazionale on Thursday may be an exciting prospect but Ipswich have lost their way in the competition that matters most: 11 league games without a win.
"Sometimes you are thinking, 'Where's the next win going to come from?' " Burley admitted. "We have to knuckle down. We have 25 games left to put it right."
That Bolton confirmed the depth of Ipswich's problems was fitting. The tremendous way Burley's side burst into the top flight last season is being replicated by Sam Allardyce's men, who are now lying in eighth.
Errors at the back and a lack of cutting edge continue to cost Ipswich. Two goals down in 25 minutes, they scored through Matt Holland just before half-time and spent most of the second half on the attack. For all their possession, though, they made only one clear chance against a defiant, physically dominant Bolton defence in which Gudni Bergsson was outstanding.
Bergsson also made an important impression at the other end. Having scored Bolton's first, he set up the second for Ricketts. "That puts us 10 points away from the danger zone," said Allardyce. "The longer we stay out of the bottom six the less pressure there is on us." The pressure, however, is mounting on Ipswich. Stewart has had two plates inserted in his jaw, which was fractured when he stooped to head a ball and was kicked accidentally by Pablo Counago. Burley gave league starts to Counago and the 17-year-old Darren Bent. Neither had the physical presence to trouble Bolton.
If Bolton's second-half performance was notable for its resilience, their display before was peppered with attacking skill. Ricketts is filling the free-scoring role set by Stewart at Portman Road last season. His excellently taken goal, which saw him run on to Bergsson's flick and lift the ball over Matteo Sereni before heading into an empty net, came after Bergsson had headed in a Per Frandsen corner.
Although Counago hit a post, Ipswich were largely uncoordinated in attack before Holland swept in from the edge of the box. Bolton's failure to hold good possession after the interval increased the pressure on their defence but Ipswich could find no way through. Sixto Peralta should have scored but hit the side-netting, and when Le Pen departed Burley must have known it would not be his day.
IPSWICH: Sereni; Makin (Le Pen 79), Bramble, Hreidarsson, Venus, Peralta, Holland, Magilton (Wright 45), Reuser, Bent (Naylor 87), Counago.Subs Not Used: Branagan, Gaardsoe. Goals: Holland 45.
BOLTON: Jaaskelainen; N'Gotty, Whitlow, Bergsson, Warhurst (Farrelly 66), Frandsen, Gardner, Nolan, Charlton, Ricketts, Wallace (Holdsworth 69). Subs Not Used: Poole, Barness, Johnson. Booked: Warhurst, Wallace. Goals: Bergsson 6, Ricketts 25.
Referee: S Bennett (Kent).
