Wycombe Wanderers boss Gareth Ainsworth believes Bolton Wanderers will pose his side a big challenge this weekend and is not interested in head-to-head records.
The two sides have played each other four times with the Chairboys taking maximum points from those encounters. Bolton are yet to score a goal against Wycombe but head into this fixture with optimism, on home soil, after a solid point at Portman Road last weekend.
Meanwhile, Ainsworth's men - who are looking to go again after defeat in the play-off final to Sunderland - saw off Burton Albion three-nil at Adams Park. Saturday will see two sides, both fancied to be up there, lock horns and Ainsworth is looking forward to the test.
“Bolton are a good side and they had a great point at Ipswich last week, who are one of the other favourite teams, so we know this is going to be a tough test this weekend without being disrespectful to Burton," said Ainsworth. “I watched the (Ipswich) game and even though Ipswich had the lion share of the chances, Bolton had some opportunities. And if you look at the fancied teams to go up this season, Bolton are one of them.
"They’ve been on a really good run of form since the turn of the year and Ian has made some good signings, so we need to make sure that we are on it. They are a good side with some very good players; we need to be aware of them and what they offer, but I don't want to give too much away in terms of what we are preparing for them.
“We’ve got to be careful when we look at past records against clubs as they don’t matter at all. Club’s change quickly and Bolton’s team, personnel, ownership and everything else have changed and I think we would be naïve to do that. A few years ago, we were the whipping boys in League Two and now, we have a way of performing and outperforming people’s expectations. I think people still look at us as ‘little Wycombe’, so we won’t be looking back at any records."
The opposition boss also gave an update on his squad, with only one Wycombe player set to definitely miss the match.
“Curtis Thompson is the only long term [injury], but the rest are quite close," said Ainsworth. "There are no fresh ones and there is no-one that we have lost. We’ve got a squad that is around 85 per cent fit and even though we have got a couple of players missing, we have got a strong squad to take up to the University of Bolton Stadium.”
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