Bolton Wanderers boss Ian Evatt believes his side must adopt the competitive edge to win duels that Wigan Athletic have 'in abundance' to take themselves to the next level.
Wanderers came from behind to collect a share of the spoils against the Latics in the lunchtime kick-off at the DW Stadium yesterday.
James McClean put the Latics in front early in the first half as his cross found its way all the way through to give the hosts an early lead.
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Leam Richardson's side dominated much of the first half but a big moment came before half-time when referee Samuel Barrott refrained from showing McClean a second yellow card following a foul on Dapo Afolayan, for whom he had fouled for his opening booking earlier in the game.
Wanderers were the better team after the break and got a deserved equaliser when Bodvarsson rose to nod home Will Aimson's cross and give Wanderers a share of the spoils.
Evatt believes Richardson's outfit are very competitive and win their duels and second balls in the middle of the park, something his team did not deal with well enough in first half of the encounter.
And the Bolton boss believes if they can add that aspect of the Latics to their own game, they will be an exciting team moving forwards.
He said: “We win or we learn and I think we’ve learnt today some positives and some negatives and there’s things that we need to work on.
"The holy grail so to speak is to have that competitive edge that I think they’ve got in abundance, by the way, I think that’s what they are. I think they’re very strong, very competitive, win duels and if we can add that to our football we’re going to be a really exciting team.
“What you find with derby games is they’re very rarely full of quality and that’s the type of team that they are, they ask you questions and they make it scrappy. They put you under pressure. They’re great, especially in midfield, at winning those second balls and we didn’t deal with it well enough.
“But I thought second half our quality was much better. I thought we were the team that were trying to find solutions by playing through some good switches, good one v one situations, and I think a wonderful cross and a fantastic header from a player that we’re delighted to have."
Bodvarsson, like several other players in the Bolton squad, came in the January transfer window and have not gone through a pre-season at Wanderers.
With the likes of Josh Sheehan to return this summer from his ruptured ACL and further strengthening to take place in the next transfer window, Evatt is excited at the upcoming prospects and taking a point against one of the 'benchmark' teams in League One in the form of Latics in an encounter where they could have picked up maximum rewards.
He said: “I think we’re really excited once we get everyone back and in one piece. Josh Sheehan was here today supporting the lads, Izzy (Lloyd Isgrove), Demps (Kyle Dempsey) improving all the time, Kieran Lee to come back and then we’ve got another transfer window to strengthen again, so things are looking really good.
"We don’t celebrate draws, it’s not what we do and not what we’re about, but we’re more satisfied with the fact that we’ve competed against a team that are a benchmark in this division at the moment and probably deserved more than what we got, but it’s good confidence booster moving forwards to know that we’re capable of doing it.”
