RONAN Darcy will get a fair crack of the whip at Wanderers, insists Ian Evatt.

The academy graduate has yet to feature in League Two this season, and clamour among fans for him to be introduced is growing stronger with each passing week.

Evatt claimed at the weekend that midfielder Darcy “needs to do more” to claim a first team spot and that he was basing his line-up on those who have performed well in training.

But the head coach believes some of his post-match comments – and particularly those regarding his young midfielder – were magnified by his own frustrations at the defeat to Oldham.

“It was a poor result and when you’ve conceded a goal in the 95th minute it isn’t a great time to be speaking and emotions can take over,” he told The Bolton News. “It can cloud your judgement a bit, it's all right there on the surface.

“I respect Ronan as a player, he’s a terrific talent, and I don’t want what was said to be interpreted that the door is closed for him because it isn’t, at all. He can have a big future.

“But I do have to back my judgement as a manager who works with his players every single day of the week.

“In the middle of midfield there is a lot of competition and players who have more experience who I have picked ahead of him.

“He just has to keep working hard because his opportunities will come.”

Having clamed down from the weekend’s reverse, Evatt has been able to analyse the issues which arose against Oldham and speak to his players.

Fully accepting that results so far have not been good enough, he remains adamant that his brand of football can be a success in the long-term at Bolton.

“Nothing good in football or nothing good in life in general comes easy,” said. “You have to work for everything. That’s how I have been brought up and I think it’s how people view things in a working-class town like Bolton as well.

“We are going through the mill a bit at the moment, there’s no doubt. I wish it wasn’t the case but it’s like we have to suffer a little bit to get to where we want to be.

“We will come out of it stronger. I will look back at this time and think ‘we did need that time to bring us together as a group, as a squad, as a town,’ and progress.

“It is frustrating and slow going at the moment but patience and support are what we need right now. We will come through it, I am sure.

“I have to be true to what I believe in because I have had success with what I believe in.

“What I see on the training ground is very good. But I reiterate – that’s the training ground. We need to translate that to the games themselves.

“I have seen little glimpses of the fact we can be very, very good. But things have to improve.”