Ian Evatt praised “silent assassin” Kieran Lee after Bolton beat Portsmouth 3-0 to secure their second win over the south coast club in five days.
Buoyed by a 1-0 quarter-final victory in the Papa Johns Trophy, Wanderers kept up their play-off in Sky Bet League One push boosted by Lee’s second-half goal and man of the match display.
“He is a delight to watch and the players love him,” said Boltom manager Evatt of the 34-year-old former Sheffield Wednesday player.
“He is quiet; a silent assassin. But he is a good, experienced player,” added Evatt, with Lee’s 47th-minute strike sandwiched between goals from Dion Charles and Eoin Toal.
“Kieran drifts and floats through games but finds some intelligent positions. He has become a bit nastier as well.
“He has won his duels and 50/50s which you perhaps don’t think Kieran Lee does those kind of things.
“If we can keep him in one piece he is a huge player for us.”
Wanderers remain fifth but are now unbeaten in eight matches in all competitions. They never looked in danger after Charles’ 12th goal of the campaign in the 15th minute.
“Playing Portsmouth last Tuesday and getting an important result, was always going to make this game more difficult,” said Evatt.
“And when you have not got a manager sometimes it gives players freedom and takes the pressure off. They can have almost a free hit.
“We started well and scored a good goal but seemed to think the job was done.
“I asked the players at half-time to keep up the intensity and energy. We got the two goals and managed to see out the game pretty comfortably.”
Portsmouth, now 15th, have not won a league game since October 22 and interim head coach Simon Bassey blamed the “bad mixture” for the visitors’ latest setback.
“We have a habit of making things hard for ourselves at the moment,” he said.
“Two minutes after half-time the game is over. At 2-0 down, against a good team and the position we are in, it gave us a real problem.
“We are not keeping clean sheets, we are not scoring goals. It is a bad mixture for confidence and a bad mixture for picking up results.
“But it is a two-way street. I picked the team and I set the tactics and they didn’t work as I wanted it to.
“Portsmouth should be looking to be in the play-offs but there are no givens. Just because you get 20,000 at home doesn’t mean you are going to be top of the league.
“But it’s not a time to feel sorry for ourselves. This is a big boys’ football club, you have got to put your big boy pants on and come to work Monday and start owning stuff.”
