SAM Allardyce got straight to the point when he summed up why Wanderers are so desperate to put their Reebok record straight against Everton tomorrow.

Reflecting on successive home defeats by Southampton, Sunderland and Newcastle, the Bolton boss admitted: "The pressure is on."

And he has not the slightest hesitation in pointing the finger at the root of the problem that is threatening to hit their hopes of Premiership survival.

"We've got to find a goal!" he said in a tone not disimilar to the desperate "Gizza Job" pleas of Yosser Hughes in Alan Bleasdale's Liverpool-based drama The Boys From The Blackstuff.

Anyone suggesting Wanderers' home form has been poor stands to be corrected by the manager who argues that, while results have been disappointing, performances have not.

"Have we created at home?" he asks pointedly. "The answer is 'Yes'. Not too many against Southampton, more against Sunderland and then more goal attempts against Newcastle than in any other game.

"We just need to make sure we stick them away. We may need a bit of luck and, perhaps, a good refereeing decision for a change instead of the bad ones we always get.

"We need to be as clinical as we have been in our last two away games - Kevin Nolan's goal at Old Trafford and Michael Ricketts three in the United and Aston Villa games - have all been clinical finishes."

With Ricketts in such a rich vein of scoring form, spirits high after taking Villa to the wire last weekend and a squad strengthened by the return of Jussi Jaaskelainen and Mike Whitlow from suspension and Paul Warhurst from injury, Allardyce is not about to ring any alarm bells just yet. But he accepts a worrying trend could be developing.

"The good start has taken the pressure off," he says from the relative comfort of ninth in the Premiership, two places higher than Everton, "but the pressure will really be on if we drop into that bottom six!

"Hopefully we won't get there at any stage. At the moment we are showing top six form away from home and bottom six form at home. So as long as we put the home form right ...

"But we haven't scored a goal at home in three matches and that's what has cost us. We have defended poorly but defending should only cost you a point or two but because we haven't scored, it means we have lost all three.

"The two areas need to be put together - a clean sheet and a goal."

To that end, Allrdyce is expected to restore Jaaskelainen, Whitlow and Warhurst to the core of his defensive unit while encouraging his midfield to ensure Ricketts gets the service to add to his already impressive eight-goal tally.

With no game for a fortnight until they travel to Ipswich on Sunday, November 18, Wanderers will spend next week at a training camp near the Spanish resort of Marbella. A win tomorrow will make the three-sessions-a-day regime so much easier to bear.

"If you've lost it's a longer hangover, if you've won, you're a bit more upbeat," the manager said, crossing his fingers.

"It's important we make the most of the break for the international weekend because there isn't another until February and we are going into a spell where bad weather and more fixtures round the Christmas period, plus a few injuries and suspensions will add to the fatigue factor."