Bolton’s chances at Liverpool ancient history, West Brom goals a cert

By Brian Sears

26 August 2011

Earlier this month we discussed the freakishly good away results being recorded in the early stages of this English season – so many more than we’d expect.

And still, after two rounds of games, that trend has continued in the Premier League, with away teams winning 28 points so far and home teams bagging a measly 22.

But despite that, and despite Bolton being one of the teams to have won on the road, at QPR on the opening day, history says their chances of victory on Saturday an Anfield are not high.

The last time Bolton won a league game at Anfield, Winston Churchill was the Prime Minister. It was 1954, and Bolton won 2-1.

But for readers who might not remember that far, let’s concentrate just on the Premier League era for detail, during which time Bolton have visited Anfield 12 times and gained just one point, or 0.08 points per game.

That draw was on New Year’s Day 2002 when Kevin Nolan equalised Steven Gerrard’s opening goal.

Bolton, historically, would far rather visit Old Trafford when it comes to gaining Premier League points. As our table shows (scroll below), they’ve won a whopping seven points at Old Trafford in the Premier League era. Seven! That’s 0.58 per game.

The only place Bolton have won fewer points per game than at Anfield (among the current 20 clubs) is at Norwich: no points from one match.

Their best tally per game is at Wolves (two wins in three visits) and their most points on the road overall have come from Blackburn.

And another thing ….

There have been 19 Premier League games this season, before the weekend kick-offs and the most popular score-line so far has been 0-0. There have been four of them: Fulham v Aston Villa, Newcastle v Arsenal, Stoke v Chelsea and Swansea v Wigan.

Over the whole of last season 0-0 was the 8th most popular score. In that high-scoring season it only occurred 25 times behind 2-1 (64), 1-0 (54), 1-1 (52), 2-0 (43), 3-0 (29), 2-2 (27) and 3-1 (27).

But if you don’t like the 0-0 score-line don’t blame West Brom. The Brummies have gone 72 league games since taking part in a no-score draw. That was on 24th October 2009 away at Coventry in the Championship. They play Stoke this weekend, and we expect 0-0 to be a Long shot (geddit?)

Here’s how many times the rest of the current Premier League sides have managed 0-0 in their last 72 league games. The range is from as high as Fulham on 10 down to Bolton and Norwich with two each.

0-0 score-lines in their last 72 league games

10 times Fulham

9 times Blackburn

7 times Aston Villa, Man City, Stoke, Swansea. Tottenham

6 times Arsenal, Liverpool, QPR, Sunderland, Wigan

5 times Man Utd, Newcastle

4 times Chelsea, Everton, Wolves

Twice Bolton, Norwich

Not at all West Brom