Wanderers 0, ARSENAL 1: It is impossible to say with any certainty, but the Gallant 10 who gave Arsenal such a run for their money were, to a man, convinced that El-Hadji Diouf blew their chances of a place in the FA Cup semi-finals.
Even allowing for the fact that they conceded a goal to Freddie Ljungberg after just three minutes and five minutes later were a man down to the finest exponents of a "one-niller" on the planet, Wanderers still came agonisingly close to at least taking the Gunners back to Highbury.
Had Stelios shown the same accuracy that dealt such a savage blow to Arsene Wenger's title hopes in January, no-one would have questioned their right to a replay.
But, as the Greek's header flashed over Jens Lehmann's crossbar, so went the last chance of their lung-bursting efforts being rewarded.
It was a marvellous effort against staggering odds but a Bolton victory was never really on from the moment Diouf lashed out in frustration and Lehmann dropped to the ground holding his face.
It should not have happened. Not because Kevin Davies should have been awarded a foul just outside the Arsenal box, when Kolo Toure climbed all over him, and not because Diouf had been barged in the back by Lauren in the second phase of the attack.
It should not have happened because Diouf should not have lashed out, whether Lehmann intimidated him or not. End of story. Diouf knows it, his team-mates know it, Sam Allardyce knows it and the supporters know it.
The man got what he deserved but the 10, who flew the flag so gallantly for the remaining 85 minutes of an enthralling FA Cup tie, deserved much more.
But, for all their efforts and the spirit with which they ventured to rescue the tie, they came up against the past masters at holding a lead.
Whether Arsenal would have had the energy to withstand an 11-man challenge is open to debate. Wenger suggested it would have made no significant difference while Sam Allardyce was convinced Wanderers would have exploited the physical and mental fatigue of players still reeling after their elimination from the Champions League by Bayern Munich three days earlier.
But it was never really on from the minute referee Steve Bennett consulted his assistant and pulled out his red card.
Wanderers already believed they had been hard done to when the Kent official ignored a Dennis Bergkamp challenge on Tal Ben Haim in the build up to Robert Pires delivering a delightful pass for an even better finish by Ljungberg, who raced away from Bruno N'Gotty before lifting the ball over the stranded Jussi Jaaskelainen.
And they questioned a string of other debatable decisions, as the card-happy ref so often made himself the centre of attention, which is never a good sign.
But Gary Speed, captain in place of the injured Jay Jay Okocha, took his hat off to the artful Arsenal.
"You can say what you like, but they are just clever footballers. That's it," said the man with arguably more experience than any other current player of seeing Arsenal at their best.
"The referee was giving them decisions and they played to that. They went down easily, yes. But you can say what you want about it and that it's cheating, but it's not. It's being clever and they were cleverer than us.
"We thought that Tal Ben Haim was fouled in the build-up to their goal, but sometimes you get them and sometimes you don't.
"I'm not saying that Arsenal make fouls look worse than they are but they know the referee is going to give it if they go down, so they go down.
"But we've got aspirations to go into Europe and, if we do, we've got to keep our discipline better and on Saturday we didn't keep it."
It was ironic that it should be Steve Bennett who dismissed Diouf, having been duped into awarding the Senegal man a crucial penalty at Blackburn in January.
Speed did not attempt to excuse Diouf's actions, suggesting instead that this might have been a case of justice being seen to be done, however unwittingly.
"We got the penalty at Blackburn which wasn't a penalty with the same referee," he said.
"It was just unfortunate that this was the FA Cup. We're out and that's it.
"We gave it our best shot and I thought the 10 men did really well. But, if you lose your discipline against teams like Arsenal, they are going to punish you and they did.
"They are the masters of how to play against 10 men and also when they go down to 10. They know what is expected of them and I think they are the worst team we could have done it against.
"We conceded the first goal, which we didn't want to do but then we went down to 10 men and against a team like Arsenal it's going to be an uphill battle."
There would have been more punishment had the impressive Jaaskelainen not come off best in two head-to-heads in the first half - denying Reyes and Ljungberg - as Arsenal played through Wanderers in their own inimitable fashion.
The Flying Finn also saved well from Reyes and Bergkamp in the second half as the Gunners' defended well and hit swiftly on the break. But even Jaaskelainen would have been powerless to prevent Ljungberg making it two in the dying seconds when Pires wrong-footed N'Gotty to tee up the simplest of chances only for the Swede to miss the daddy of all sitters.
Fernando Hierro was a pivotal figure in midfield, dictating the direction of the Wanderers attacks, but free-kicks and long-throws aimed at Kevin Davies offered the only genuine hope of rescuing a draw.
Tireless in his efforts, sometimes over-exuberant, Davies made sure the Arsenal defenders were always on their toes and was a constant threat to Toure and Senderos at the set-pieces that caused Arsenal so many problems in the 2-2 draw at Highbury in September.
Stelios almost capitalised on two in the first half but Lehmann was there both times.
"We're all knackered and disappointed," Davies said. "We know we've competed against one of the best teams in the Premiership and given them a good game with 10 men so we can be proud really.
"I think we all felt we could have won it and, if we'd played like that with 11 men, we would probably have got something."
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