Why Bolton Wanderers have changed captains mid-season

Joe Smith, Jimmy Seddon, Harry Goslin, Nat Lofthouse, Warwick Rimmer, John Ritson, Roy Greaves, Phil Brown, Gudni Bergsson, Jay-Jay Okocha, Kevin Nolan, Kevin Davies – just a small selection of the famous players who have captained the club through the good times and the bad.

A job which carries great distinction is not without its pressures. And it was for that reason Ian Evatt decided to make a bold change six games into the new season, giving former skipper Ricardo Santos a chance to rediscover his best fitness and form away from the main glare of the spotlight.

Thomason, he reasoned, “doesn’t feel” the same strains. At 22 he is potentially the youngest permanent captain in the club’s history and certainly since Harry Brockbank took the job a few times in early 2019/20, memorably captaining the ‘Junior Whites’ to a point against future champions Coventry City.

Youthful exuberance, or a lack of baggage may be a factor. Santos has led the team since late 2021 when, in his own words, he turned up for training one morning to find the club had sold the previous captain, Antoni Sarcevic.

Ricardo Santos captained Bolton to the Papa Johns Trophy in 2023 (Image: CameraSport - Andrew Kearns)

His remit has always been to lead by example. Naturally a more relaxed and pleasant person off the field, the big defender is not an archetypal shouter on the pitch, even if he has improved on that front in recent times.

For so many reasons the focus rests on Santos in Evatt’s team. He often sees more of the ball than most, he is left to defend one v one because of his athletic qualities, and his physical size often stands him out in a crowded penalty box.

Since the turn of the year Wanderers’ form has been patchy, and there is at least some correlation with the way Santos has been playing too. He was patched up to play with a calf injury for the final few months of last season, with mixed results, and though he now feels in the best shape of his career – focussing on gym work harder than ever before – he has been part of a team that had badly stuttered, at least until Saturday.

Evatt’s decision to turn to Thomason, one of the dressing room’s more erudite and considered characters, is intended to try and reduce the burden on Santos and give him more time to focus on his own game.

It can be debated whether the captain’s job is as central to the team’s performance in modern football as it might once have been. For better or worse, there is a greater tactical emphasis and the game moves faster now than it ever has, meaning the channels of communication on the pitch cannot simply come from one source, however loud.

It is well documented that players at Bolton are given as much tactical information to digest as they can handle. Santos, as a centre-half who often finds himself on the ball, was seen as the ideal conduit. But perhaps Thomason – always in tune with the manager’s thinking whenever he sits down to discuss a game – is now seen as the better way to get messaging into the heart of the team?

Outside the transfer window, Evatt had only a handful of changes he could conceivably make to try and get Bolton back on a winning run. The most drastic was abandoning the 3-4-2-1 system which was introduced in the summer as an evolution of the one which had been choked out by Oxford United in the play-off final at Wembley.

Reverting back to the 3-5-2 he had used exclusively for the previous two seasons brought a rare moment of contrition from the Bolton boss, who accepted he may have tried to change ‘too much, too soon’ as the disappointment spilled out into the summer.

The captaincy change may be viewed as cosmetic, depending on how much weight you attach to the role, but doing so in-season is not totally uncommon in Bolton’s recent history.

Back in 2013, Jay Spearing gradually eased himself into the role over Zat Knight when the defender was no longer regarded as a first team regular. But by February 2015, Bolton’s deteriorating financial condition meant he was loaned out to Blackburn Rovers to save on a chunk of cash owned to Liverpool, leaving Matt Mills to continue in the job for last final few months.

Kevin Nolan was Bolton's skipper for three-and-a-half years (Image: PA) Kevin Davies in action as captain of Bolton for the first time against Tottenham in January 2009 (Image: PA)

Kevin Nolan’s surprise £4million move to Newcastle United in January 2009 came just hours after a 2-2 draw at Blackburn Rovers, made memorable for manager Gary Megson’s post-match pop at a second of abusive Bolton Wanderers supporters.

The next day Kevin Davies was informed that he would be taking on the job, a fact he celebrated with two goals against Tottenham in a thrilling 3-2 win at the Reebok the following weekend.

And winding the clock back further to November 2005, Wanderers made a captaincy change which truly does echo the current situation when Sam Allardyce informed veteran Jay-Jay Okocha that he would be stood down in favour of young pretender, Nolan, who was then just 23.

"He has been a fantastic captain during one our most successful periods,” Big Sam said of the Nigerian wizard. "I have had a mature discussion with Jay-Jay about relinquishing his role as captain, so he can concentrate on recapturing the form that made him one of the most prodigious talents in the Premiership.”

On Nolan, he added: "He has got the right qualities to be a great leader of the team.

"Kevin is very experienced for someone so young and, above all else, he has the respect of the whole squad."

Jay-Jay Okocha in action for Wanderers as captain in 2004 (Image: PA)

Okocha did see out of the season with Bolton, making 28 more appearances before his last, against Birmingham City, as a second-half substitute for Hidetoshi Nakata.

Speaking in the January of 2006, he admitted the move had not been easy to take.

“The truth is sometimes difficult to accept but I try to adopt a spiritual attitude to such decisions,” he told The Bolton News. “Sam Allardyce thought it was the right time to have a change of guard because Kevin has a good future with the club and no one knows how much time I have left at Bolton, which is a fair point.”

Santos is not on the same countdown clock as Jay-Jay, then in his mid-thirties, but he is in the final year of his contract at Wanderers. At 29 his next deal could be a career-defining one and so the opportunity to try and earn it by recapturing his best form at Bolton could suit all parties.

For Thomason, a chance to show that like his predecessor Nolan, he can thrive as the focal point of the team from midfield.