EVERY once in a while, Ian Evatt’s Wanderers produce a moment of such staggering ineffectiveness, you do wonder what all the fuss is about.

It has been very easy to lavish praise on the Bolton manager and his team this season – records have been set, awards have been collected and for the most part this group of players has looked better prepared to mount an automatic promotion push than those who trudged off at Oakwell in the play-off semi-final back in May.

But just when the confidence started to radiate beyond the dressing room and around the fanbase, winning over doubters who had lingered since the last meltdown, you get another footballing equivalent of a spoke in the wheels, like this defeat against Bristol Rovers.

Not much about this performance screamed ‘top two side’. The first 45 minutes was as poor as we have seen from a Bolton team all season, and that includes the horrendous 4-0 defeat to Wigan Athletic.

A ropey start gifted John Marquis the opening goal on 10 minutes, yet things crumbled further once Ricardo Santos was given a straight red for a professional foul on Aaron Collins. Antony Evans then made it 2-0 less than 60 seconds after Evatt had sacrificed top-scorer Dion Charles for an extra defender in Will Forrester.

The Bolton boss later attempted to substantiate his decision, which evoked a cacophony of unhappiness around the Toughsheet Stadium, arguing that it had contributed to the improved showing after half time. In one sense he was correct, the Whites were better, but it is also hard to see how they could have been much worse.

A substitution has not been met with as much venom since Gary Megson’s famous Gavin McCann-for-Ivan-Klasnic switch against Hull City in 2009. He later admitted the decision “went down like the Bismarck” and was sacked the following morning.

The second-half improvement with 10 men shows there is fight in Evatt’s squad and had Eoin Toal’s late goal been scored slightly earlier, or referee Carl Brook added more than five minutes of injury time, then maybe, not beyond the realms of possibility. It would have been harsh on Bristol Rovers, however, who added their name to the list of teams who have successfully ruffled Bolton’s feathers and claimed a result.

On Monday night at Portsmouth, Evatt had been disappointed to see some of his team’s old bad habits creeping in. “I thought we had moved past this sort of performance,” he reflected.

Before the half time whistle on Saturday, some of his players certainly hadn't 'moved on,' they seemed to be suffering flashbacks from Fratton Park. Slow, disorganised, sloppy in possession – this was the complete antithesis of the team which walloped Exeter City in their last home game in the league.

Individual errors have suddenly started to creep in over the last couple of games and rather than finding the ‘reset’ button when they occur, the Whites are reaching straight for the one marked ‘panic’.

Going a goal down 10 minutes in was not an ideal start. Rovers moved the ball well down the right through Grant Ward and Antony Evans – but Toal allowed space to cross, Aaron Morley lost his runner and Marquis darted in front of Santos to score from close range.

That should have been the cue for Bolton to take a deep breath, roll up their sleeves and start again. But the errors just kept on coming.

Santos’s red card was as easy a decision as a referee will have made this weekend. Toal played a simple ball back to the captain and keeper Nathan Baxter had pushed outside his penalty box to offer an easy square pass. The centre-half’s poor touch let Collins in, however, and rather than allow him to roll the ball into an empty net he clumsily tripped the player from behind.

So often a barometer of the mood and form at Wanderers, Santos had not looked on his game from kick-off. He wasn’t alone – half a dozen others looked like they had spent the previous five days watching replays of the defeat at Pompey, strapped to a chair, a la A Clockwork Orange.

Jack Iredale wasn’t perfect but at least added some energy and enthusiasm on the left flank, and Jon Dadi Bodvarsson showed some classy touches when he got the chance, but elsewhere? Slim pickings indeed.

Forrester’s introduction, though somewhat controversial at the time, did eventually calm things down. By the start of the second half the visitors had rained 10 shots on goal, whereas Bolton had failed to register a single one. Between the 46th and 95th minute, the distribution was a much more respectable nine to five.

There were a few penalty areas scrambles and blocked shots in the second half which made you suspect it just wasn’t going to be Bolton’s day. And, in truth, a good number of people had left the building way before Toal slotted home Randell Williams’s deflected free kick in the 86th minute.

Evatt had asked the fans to get behind his team, but the players simply had to give them more to go on than they did in the first half. The folk who stayed on tried impressively to cajole their team into a comeback towards the bitter end, yet the cluster of subs thrown on to try and rescue the game simply got embroiled in Rovers’ spoiling tactics towards the end, nothing more.

We are coming towards the halfway point of the season, and a natural stage to assess exactly how Evatt and his players are doing in their pursuit of Championship football.

Whilst true, Wanderers move into second spot if they win their game in hand, it is occasions such as this which make it so difficult to predict the path ahead.

Though no supporter expects their team to go through the rest of the season undefeated, the manner of both this and the Pompey result felt out of the blue, without any obvious cause.

It might make for good TV. Storyboarding the next documentary is going to be interesting. Yet for those watching in real time it is hard to view the last seven days without a tinge of concern.