EOIN Toal will be out of action for the rest of the year at Wanderers after sustaining a torn hamstring in the midweek win at Stevenage.

The Northern Ireland international limped off in the first half at the Lamex Stadium and faces around eight weeks on the sidelines.

Ian Evatt explained: “It’s a significant hamstring tear, not the tendon, which is important, so I think it could have been worse, it could have been better, it sits somewhere in the middle.

“It is roughly where we expected on first assessment.”

Wanderers are also waiting for news on Kyle Dempsey, who has visited a consultant to find out if a knee problem can be solved with a relatively straightforward ‘clean out’ operation, or whether it requires anything more complicated.

Gethin Jones is close to returning after a knee injury suffered in pre-season, which has had some complications, and Jordi Osei-Tutu is also due back after the international break, having torn a calf muscle in the Bristol Street Motors Trophy against Barrow.

George Thomason and Nathan Baxter are also due back after the break after muscular injuries but Evatt insists Bolton are not an isolated case.

“I don’t think it’s just us,” he said. “Teams in all divisions seem to be suffering and I just think it’s part of the game now – I don’t know if it’s linked to the speed of it all, different surfaces, I don’t know what the answer is, but there certainly seems to be a high trend of this kind of thing.

“We are suffering and we will do our best to try and navigate our way through.”

Wanderers reached the third round of the FA Cup last season but have curiously not won an away game in the competition for more than a decade.

Marvin Sordell was on target twice at Sunderland in January 2013 the last time the Whites won an FA Cup game on the road, but with his side in good form, Evatt hopes to change that on Saturday.

He said: “I think post-Huddersfield and the immediate aftermath, it was important everyone took some time and responded. We managed to do that and have had one defeat, then one really disappointing draw against Shrewsbury, but other than that it has been quite positive.

“In the last couple of games in particular we have been at a level we haven’t really seen this season, so it is important we continue that upward trend.”