Carlisle United 1 Bolton Wanderers 4: Ian Evatt stood with his arms behind his back, not so much manager as contented spectator. For a period in the second half he placed his hands in his pockets. Then he went back to Plan A.
It would not have been a total surprise to see the Bolton Wanderers manager pull out a chair, line up some snacks and get his feet up. From a coaching and technical point of view, this game required the lightest of touches by the visiting boss.
It is true that there was one goal in it for a while until Bolton scored twice in added time. Mostly, though, a chasm separated Evatt’s side and Carlisle.
In United’s dugout there was much more work to be done. There were multiple consultations between Paul Simpson and Gavin Skelton, much pointing and rubbing of chins. There was a strategic overhaul after a quarter of the game, a double substitution after half of it, further adjustments, further spins; all for nothing.
And the demoralising reality is this: no matter what Carlisle try, whichever signings they introduce and whichever combinations they attempt, the level of League One remains too high, too refined, for this team to get close enough for long enough.
A Bolton side that played as they did in October, when United made that remarkable raid on the Toughsheet Community Stadium, might have given them a chance. A Bolton side that performed as they did here…not a prayer.
Had Carlisle taken a competitive total from the more mediocre rungs of the division, days like this wouldn’t be quite so cold. As it is, United need points from anyone and everyone, including the best at their level. And they did not look remotely capable of taking anything from Bolton. With 17 games to go, they remain ten points adrift in the relegation zone.
The way things panned out on Saturday is how it often should be given the respective teams’ recent histories, size and recruitment strength. All defeats like this show is just how big the gap is, just how much space United had to try and bridge upon promotion and just how far short of doing so they remain.
However much the “step change” budget is applied – six new signings have come in January so far, and not a single point gained since New Year’s Day – Carlisle are still having to work out how to contain sharp and able players such as Josh Sheehan, Bolton’s canny midfield operator, and Kyle Dempsey, a dynamo on his return to Brunton Park.
These are not players in United’s realistic reach. Catch them on a good day, coupled with a blunt one of your own, and this is what you get. “I can't argue with the result, I'm not gonna try and flower it up in any way,” said Simpson. “They were way ahead of us.”
A cool and sunlit January afternoon gave way to the harsh chill of United’s position almost immediately. The idea of Carlisle finding some survival spirit and pressing Evatt’s ball-players into discomfort was soon mocked by Bolton, whose composure and movement were levels ahead, who used their width well and exposed Carlisle as a rather lumpen team chasing unsuccessfully for anything they could get in comparison.
Dempsey was booed by some home fans as he received the ball, but brushed this off as did his team-mates who jabbed at the Blues’ box before landing some heavier blows. Paris Maghoma, floating between the lines, had a few menacing shots. Josh Dacres-Cogley showed his occasional potency on the right. Jon Mellish sliced a clearance in front of his goal and Carlisle, amid a spell of siege midway through the half, barely made it from their own box for long.
A succession of corners caused some discord, Eoin Toal finding half the penalty area free at one point, while Carlisle’s attempts to counter lacked the pace or fluidity to trouble Ricardo Santos and his defence. Dan Butterworth put one shot over the bar but otherwise it was all Bolton, suffocatingly so.
Dempsey, where it mattered, evaded Owen Moxon: Maryport outclassing Carlisle. The weight of pressure at one point forced Mellish, unchallenged, to stumble and concede another corner. It was a telling little cameo and, while Simpson’s moving of Mellish into midfield briefly affected Bolton’s flow, it did not improve Carlisle’s security as they conceded on 31 minutes, Sheehan’s floated ball clearing Jack Ellis, Zac Ashworth’s cushioned volley clearing Harry Lewis.
Mellish almost levelled, heading an Alfie McCalmont cross just wide, but that was an isolated surge given that, five minutes later, Maghoma was dropping the shoulder to claim a clinical second.
It did not flatter Evatt’s side, who looked well capable of more. Carlisle, meanwhile, could not help themselves, the poverty of their efforts highlighted in a lack of coherent support to Luke Armstrong and then summed up when, in added first-half time, Jack Robinson flopped a free-kick into the front line of white bodies, an opportunity fizzling out sadly.
Simpson made substitutions and hoped for some fresh zest. Jack Diamond, to the left on his debut, and Jordan Gibson to the right, offered the possibility of invention, while Mellish, through sheer gusto, tried to force a way back. Ten minutes into the half he turned smoothly and rifled a shot beneath the bar, only for Nathan Baxter to fingertip it over. Later he powered down the left and won a corner: some urgency, at least, in a cause that sorely needed it.
And from that urgency, something duly came: another spell of Carlisle effort, and Gibson driving the ball powerfully inside Baxter’s near post, his fourth goal of the season against these high-grade opponents.
It was, though, a token moment. Josh Vela came on to add his experience to United's midfield and Evatt swapped both his strikers, but the remainder was an object lesson in game management from a good side and energetic impotence from the other – and, as United committed men forward and punched themselves out, Dempsey took advantage.
First, he greedily broke onto several balls down the right and examined Carlisle with crosses. Then, in added time, he bulleted clear to the left, fired past Lewis and celebrated in front of the away fans before cupping his ears to the Paddock.
The travelling hordes who took their cue to celebrate Dempsey’s 2023 assault conviction in song won the prize for bad taste. Evatt’s team then made sure of the real prize – the points – when Nathanael Ogbeta, off the bench, arrived as the free man to ram home number four. Bolton disappeared over the horizon, entirely stress-free; Carlisle remained under their lingering cloud.
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