WHAT about that Rob Styles? Okay, we’ve seen free-kicks given and not given in situations like that but I thought it was six of one and half a dozen of the other between Kevin Nolan and Pepe Reina and, one thing I do know – the decision to disallow Gary Cahill’s goal on Saturday was the turning point of the game.

If we’d gone in at 1-1 at half-time, it would have been a completely different game.

Even then I thought some of the football in the second half was as good as anything we’ve seen from Bolton this season.

And they were still in it until 18 minutes from the end when Liverpool took advantage of Andy O’Brien’s mistake to make the game safe.

Andy’s the one I feel most sorry for because, for me, he’s been one of our most consistent players. But he’s a top class pro and a lovely lad and I’m sure he’ll soon get over it.

I don’t think there was any disgrace to lose to Liverpool, though. It’s a bit too early to be talking about the title, but I think they’ve got as good a chance this year as they’ve had for a long time. They are the best team I’ve seen at the Reebok this season and, let’s face it, if they’d taken their chances, they’d have had the game sewn up long before they did.

But I spoke to a few of their lads after the game – Stevie Gerrrad gave me his shirt to give to my mum because he knows she’s a Liverpool fan – and they said how hard we’d made it for them. Jamie Carragher said Ricardo Gardner had been a real handful and I thought Gavin McCann did brilliantly again. He doesn’t get a lot of credit but he’s been making some big contributions lately.

I’m sure we can go to Middlesbrough on Saturday with a lot of confidence. It’s a winnable game and with 14 coaches going across, we’ll have a good following of fans. That was where the club’s free travel initiative first paid off last season and I’m looking forward to it having an impact again, definitely if we play like we did in the second half on Saturday.

I know we didn’t get the result we were looking for but it turned out to be a good weekend for one of our young season ticket holders.

Holly Whitehead from Buxton has been seriously ill in hospital recently but she was allowed home at the weekend because it was her 15th birthday.

Kevin Nolan and the lads sent her their best wishes – a card and a lovely letter – and I got them to dedicate the Hull win to her.

I had a chat with her mum, Dawn, yesterday after Holly had gone back into hospital and they were delighted with how she’d picked up over the weekend