By Mark Heys
September 28 2006

Bolton Wanderers play host to North West rivals Liverpool this Saturday lunchtime in what will be a live televised encounter on Sky Sports.

Wanderers currently lie a point ahead of the Reds in seventh place following their hard fought Premiership victory against Portsmouth on Monday evening so Sam Allardyce will be hopeful of similar commitment against the Merseysiders this weekend.

The Trotters are so far undefeated at the Reebok Stadium this season as they go in search of recording their third consecutive win from the last ten days against a Liverpool team who have not been victorious away at Bolton in exactly four years.

In this fixture last season the two teams contested an entertaining 2-2 draw with Spaniard Luis Garcia striking an excellent equalising goal for Liverpool with just minutes to spare on the clock.

Both managers pointed the finger at opposing players for their lack of gamesmanship back in January and this soured what was otherwise a keenly contested match.

Firstly, Bolton manager Allardyce wasn't happy at some of the challenges put in by Liverpool's midfield duo Steven Gerrard and Mohammed Sissoko. This was then followed up later by a cheating/diving claim against Trotters front man El-Hadji Diouf by Reds boss Rafa Benitez.

Wanderers are without Ricardo Gardner, Joey O'Brien and Henrik Pedersen through injury and South African Quinton Fortune is once again a doubt with an ankle problem.

If Fortune doesn't make the game then Israeli centre half Tal-Ben Haim will once again play out of position as a left back, a role which he did well in against Pompey.

Liverpool manager Benitez is still without long term absentee Harry Kewell. The Australian winger has flown back to his native country recently to try and aid his recovery from septic arthritis in his foot.

England forward Peter Crouch is once again expected to lead the Liverpool attack after his impressive two goal showing during Wednesday's champions league game against Galatasary.

PREMIERSHIP RECORD

23/09/1995 LIVERPOOL 5 (Fowler 4, Harkness) BOLTON WANDERERS 2 (Todd, Patterson)

09/12/1995 BOLTON WANDERERS 0 LIVERPOOL 1 (Collymore)

01/11/1997 BOLTON WANDERERS 1 (Blake) LIVERPOOL 1 (Fowler)

07/03/1998 LIVERPOOL 2 (Ince, Owen) BOLTON WANDERERS 1 (Thompson)

27/08/2001 BOLTON WANDERERS 2 (Ricketts, Holdsworth) LIVERPOOL 1 (Heskey)

01/01/2002 LIVERPOOL 1 (Gerrard) BOLTON WANDERERS 1 (Nolan)

14/09/2002 BOLTON WANDERERS 2 (Gardner, Campo) LIVERPOOL 3 (Baros 2, Heskey)

08/03/2003 LIVERPOOL 2 (Diouf, Owen) BOLTON WANDERERS 0

26/12/2003 LIVERPOOL 3 (Hyppia, Sinama-Pongolle, Smicer) BOLTON WANDERERS 1 (Pedersen)

07/02/2004 BOLTON WANDERERS 2 (Hunt, Djorkaeff) LIVERPOOL 2 (Hyppia, Gerrard)

29/08/2004 BOLTON WANDERERS 1 (Davies) LIVERPOOL 0

02/04/2005 LIVERPOOL 1 (Biscan) BOLTON WANDERERS 0

02/01/2006 BOLTON WANDERERS 2 (Jaidi, Diouf) LIVERPOOL 2 (Gerrard, Garcia)

09/04/2006 LIVERPOOL 1 (Fowler) BOLTON WANDERERS 0

PREMIERSHIP FORM GUIDE:

Played: 14

Won: 2

Drawn: 4

Lost: 8

CONNECTIONS

Nicolas Anelka, Peter Beardsley, El-Hadji Diouf, Roger Hunt, Sammy Lee, Jason McAteer, Phil Neal, Jon Otsemobor, Mark Seagraves, Peter Thompson, Johnny Wheeler

IT HAPPENED WHEN BOLTON PLAYED LIVERPOOL

Premiership legend Robbie Fowler ran riot when these two sides met in September 1995 as he scored four goals for Liverpool in their 5-2 win over the Wanderers at Anfield.

Fowler scored again in the first ever meeting between these two sides at the Reebok Stadium in November 1997 but later saw red in that game for striking a Bolton player.

Current Celtic winger Alan Thompson scored a superb goal from distance at Anfield in March 1998 when playing a one-two with then Bolton team mate Nathan Blake. Liverpool came back to win the game 2-1 with a rather youthful Michael Owen on the scoresheet.

Dean Holdsworth scored one of the most bizarre goals in Bolton history as his last minute effort slithered under Liverpool goalkeeper Sander Westerveld to give Bolton a 2-1 victory in this fixture in August 2001.

Bolton where forced to give 17-year old youngster Danny Livesey his debut in this fixture in September 2002 as a first half substitute for the injured Anthony Barness. Liverpool went on to win the game 3-2 courtesy in the main of two Milan Baros goals

Liverpudlian Kevin Nolan captained the Bolton side on his first visit as a Bolton player to Anfield on New Years Day 2002 and weighed in with the Wanderers goal in a 1-1 draw.

Current Wanderer El-Hadji Diouf was once a ten million Liverpool signing but scored just three goals in over 50 games. One of his three Reds goals came against Bolton at Anfield in March 2003.

Bolton record buy Nicolas Anelka spent the latter half of the 2001-2002 season on loan to Liverpool. He scored four league goals from a possible twenty matches.