THE seven Bolton internationals who were off on their travels on Monday were the lucky ones.

For the next week and a half, Jussi Jaaskelainen, Tal Ben Haim, Radhi Jaidi, Stelios, El-Hadji Diouf, Gary Speed and Ricardo Gardner can concentrate on World Cup matters -- well out of earshot of Sam Allardyce.

Those who do not have the good fortune to represent their countries will spend the next five days as a captive audience at a training camp in Portugal -- and it will be no picnic, judging by the manager's mood after witnessing a defeat that knocked him for six.

Big Sam could have done with a tonic after being laid up for part of the week with a chest infection. Instead, he had another sickener -- a performance that deserved nothing, and got nothing, and left Wanderers suffering the indignity of being the first Premiership team to lose to one of the promoted three.

The "lucky seven" will not get off Scot free, though. They were there for the tongue-lashing on Saturday -- locked in the dressing room at The Hawthorns for the best part of an hour as the manager conducted his longest ever post-match inquest, letting his players know, in no uncertain terms, how disgusted he was with their performance. And, while they might have 10 days' respite, they can expect more tough talking when they return at the back end of next week to prepare for the home game against Crystal Palace.

And woe betide them if they don't get that one right.

So concerned was Allardyce with the performance at West Brom, that he considered following Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson's example and keeping his international players back as long as possible.

He obviously felt an hour was not enough to get it off his chest when he said with rising anger: "I haven't invoked the 'four day rule' like Sir Alex, but I'm not far off doing it!

"The rest of the players will stay together and we'll keep them focused, and I've told the players who are not with us that they had better start switching themselves on the minute they've played their last games for their countries. We'll have little time to prepare for the Crystal Palace game and, if they are not switched on to the way Bolton Wanderers play, then life will be difficult for us again."

Having so many internationals -- 10 including Jay-Jay Okocha, who has been ruled out of Nigeria's World Cup plans, Henrik Pedersen, who is struggling to make it for Denmark, and Nicky Hunt, who is on U21 duty with England -- is a sign of Wanderers' strength but, at times like these, Allardyce would prefer having a clear fortnight to work with the bulk of his squad rather than half of them jetting here, there and everywhere.

But he has left them under no illusions. He described the performance at West Brom as "unbelievable" in the light of how well they had performed in previous games and, ignoring the league table as it stands today, warned that, far from challenging for the top six spot, they could be destined for another survival fight, if they do not pick up.

"I'm concerned about the results," he said, putting the Liverpool, Manchester United and Liverpool games into perspective. "Results are the game we are in and, although you'd like the performance to go with the wins, just winning is enough in this league and, in the last four games, we have only drawn three and lost one -- and that is not a good run at all.

"That slips us into relegation form and we've got to turn that round as quickly as possible by beating Crystal Palace."

In an eight-minute press conference, Allardyce did not go into the detail of what had taken him 55 minutes in the privacy of the dressing room but he gave an insight.

"I just said how disappointed I felt. I pointed out that this defeat was probably deserved. Where they slipped up and didn't deserve it was in not beating Manchester United when they conceded the equaliser in the 90th minute, and not beating Birmingham when they completely dominated the game in the first half.

"Apart from the first 10 to 15 minutes and the last 10 to 15 minutes ... it was unbelievable to watch that sort of performance when we've been performing so well.

"Even though we've been disappointed at dropping some points recently, this time the team just didn't do the job they normally do. We had too many players playing below par to begin with but overall they were not determined enough to make life difficult for West Brom.

"When you've got a side lacking in confidence and struggling to score goals, the last thing you want to do is gift them two, but that's what we did.

"When you come across teams at a time when they are struggling, you have to bury them out of sight -- and you'll do that if you play to your best.

"But we aren't getting to our best when we come across these teams and that's a real problem for us.

"That's where our bread and butter lies; that's what gets us in the top half and keeps us in the top half. The bonus comes from beating Liverpool, and drawing with Manchester United and at Arsenal but, if we don't do the first bit, we'll never get in the top half. We didn't do it against Birmingham, and we failed miserably against West Brom."