WANDERERS have held firm amid interest in top stars like Dapo Afolayan this summer.

Ian Evatt has confirmed that the club has fielded enquiries for players over the past few months and that they have refused to budge on their valuation.

Afolayan has been linked with moves to Rangers and Fulham, while club skipper Ricardo Santos also admitted last week that he had the option of signing elsewhere before extending his contract at the UniBol.

Asked at the club’s Portugal training base if he had turned down offers, Evatt told The Bolton News: “There have been conversations.

“But there has been a consistent message, and that is if clubs want to come and take our players they had better have deep pockets.

“We are sat here (in Portugal) and Rico and Dapo are five yards away from me, so it shows we do what we say and we say what we do. “We want to keep hold of our best players.”

Wanderers have now returned from Portugal and will prepare to face Longridge Town in their opening pre-season friendly on Tuesday night.

Loanees James Trafford, from Manchester City, and Conor Bradley, from Liverpool, will link-up with the squad for the first time today, and both could feature in midweek.

Jack Iredale will also make his first appearance in a Bolton shirt at Longridge, with the former Cambridge defender expecting to play 45 minutes to ease his way into the pre-season schedule.

Evatt is in no doubt about his best bit of business this summer, however, and that was to secure the long-term future of his captain, Santos.

The Bolton boss says the defender has come to personify what he wants from the team over the past two seasons.

“I think it is the most important signing we’ll make in this transfer window and I don’t think anyone else we bring into the building will make me think otherwise,” he said.

“Rico is ingrained in everything we are trying to do. He’s the captain, the leader, a wonderful human being. And aside from that he is a very good footballer.

“The way we want to coach them, it is imperative we kept him. He is central to it all.

“How we can commit bodies high up the pitch, leave him in huge spaces one-v-one, it benefits us immensely.

“Rico appreciates the value of the fanbase, the value of the facilities, what we have built as a football club, the culture, the ownership group.

“Sharon Brittan has a great relationship with the players, there is a trust there, and that doesn’t often happen in football clubs.

“While it isn’t financial, it still has a value, and Rico hugely appreciates it.”