EVERYONE at Bolton Wanderers was devastated to hear of the sad passing of Nat Lofthouse – the legend.

He had been unwell for some time but that didn’t make it any easier because he held such a special place in all our hearts and, of course, a special place in football.

We will all miss him but, like the chairman said at the weekend, we will also celebrate his life and I am sure that when tributes are paid to him at the Chelsea game next Monday we will all be hoping the result fits the occasion.

It is bound to be an emotional night with a lot of sadness, but, knowing the fella he was I’m sure Nat will be looking down on his beloved Wanderers, cheering the lads on and wanting three points.

Don’t forget, he wasn’t just the greatest player and a revered and respected figurehead, he was also the team’s biggest fan.

What I found quite poignant about his passing was that it came on the night that the Lifeline Society – the massive fundraising operation that Nat played such a major role in getting off the ground in the 1980s – was holding its big event at the Reebok Stadium.

The money they have provided has helped fund some of the fantastic facilities we see today at Lostock and Euxton and, in many ways, those places can be regarded as part of Nat’s legacy.

Only a part because, as we all know, Nat’s influence on Wanderers since he arrived at the club as a 14-year-old is immeasurable.

We’ve all got our stories about how Nat touched our lives.

I personally owed him a lot because of the encouragement he always gave me and I was delighted when the teams I played in were able to give him such pleasure as we did with those famous FA Cup wins at Liverpool, Everton and Arsenal in the 1990s.

As players we looked up to him in many ways and took a lot of guidance from him. Bruce Rioch used to point to Nat and the players from the 1958 FA Cup winning team as examples of what a good team spirit was all about and I saw that for myself when I went with the players to attend Nat’s “This Is Your Life” programme.

You could see when he was with all his old team-mates what a good spirit they must have had when they were playing.

It was fascinating for us listening to all the stories they were telling.

It was an honour to be in their company and there was Nat Lofthouse at the heart of it.

Last year when we were over in Northern Ireland with the Youth team playing in the Milk Cup, we went to a civic reception over in Coleraine and among the invited guests was Harry Gregg, the Manchester United keeper Nat Lofthouse famously barged into the net for the second goal at Wembley in that 1958 final.

Harry Gregg came over to sit with us, not just because we were football people but because he knew we were from Bolton Wanderers.

And the first thing he asked us was: “How’s that old so-and-so Lofthouse?”.

When we told him Nat wasn’t in the best of health he was genuinely upset.

But he couldn’t resist telling us the tale of being determined to get his own back on Nat. “I promised myself after that game that I’d get the old so-and-so and some time later I got the opportunity,” Gregg told us, smiling. “We were going for a 50-50 ball and I decided I wasn’t going to hold back and I hit him with everything.

“But Lofty being Lofty, he just picked himself up, winked at me and carried on playing.”

RORY Delap’s long-distance throw-ins have been a major weapon in Stoke City’s Premiership armoury.

Every team, from the top of the table to the bottom, has to work on ways to cope with the threat of the ball spearing into their goalmouth.

It’s a tactic Tony Pulis has used to good effect and you can’t blame him.

But I’ve put the clock on Delap and I reckon Stoke must owe the rest of the league hours and hours of wasted time.

Check it out next time they are on the telly. He can take 30 to 40 seconds to take a throw-in, sometimes having to go from one side of the pitch to the other, taking time to dry the ball properly and then winding up before launching it into the area.

It’s part and parcel of Stoke’s attacking method but it also causes long delays and can prevent the opposition getting any impetus.

That’s what happened on occasions in the second half at the Britannia Stadium on Saturday and although you can look at other reasons why Stoke took the points, it didn’t help Wanderers at a time when they were getting into the game and building up a momentum.

I’m surprised opposition managers haven’t picked up on it but I think it’s something the officials have got to look at and clamp down on.

It’s time referees put the clock on Delap to make sure he doesn’t rob the game of more precious time.

OWEN Coyle does not like losing and he will not be happy about the way results have gone recently, but he will handle it well, just as he was handling the good results we were enjoying earlier in the season.

Remember what I was saying before Christmas: no prizes are ever dished out in January. There is a lot of football to be played and we are still in a healthy position, much healthier than we expected at the start of the season.

We’ve been unlucky over Christmas with a few injuries and a pretty hectic schedule but it seems Owen is getting somewhere close to his strongest squad again and I think he will enjoy having a few days to work with them before the Chelsea game.

I can see him giving them a few days of light work as he fine-tunes things to get them back on track and running smoothly again.