WHAT Bolton needs is a good-level non-league football club.

The town has got almost everything else on its impressive list of sporting riches.

But when all those great non-league clubs’ FA Cup giant-killings from down the years are being shown on television, I wish there was a Bolton connection.

The best we have got are the Atherton duo — Collieries and Laburnum Rovers — and Daisy Hill from Westhoughton, who all play in the sixth level of the non-league ladder.

Go out to Manchester and you start to see Conference and Conference North sides — for the uninitiated, those divisions are the first and second levels of the non-league ladder. So why do we have to go so far down to find the best non-league teams within the circulation area of this newspaper, and further down to find the best sides from the town of Bolton?

The highest non-league team anywhere around our parts is Ramsbottom United. They play in non-league's third tier. Ramsbottom United were started by Harry Williams in the late 1960s and have been dragged up by his own determination, hard work and good business nous into a super little outfit who do not seem to know where their limits are. But it is not Bolton.

Neither is Radcliffe where their team, Borough, are the next-highest local side, occupying a place in non-league's fourth level. Come to that, Atherton is not Bolton either – and Daisy Hill is in the borough of Bolton rather than the town.

After that, the highest-level football team is Eagley – who are in the seventh tier of non-league. Eagley are followed by a quartet of non-league eighth-tier clubs – Tempest United, Turton, Bolton County (all from West Lancashire League Division One) and Breightmet United (of Manchester League Division One).

It seems odd that one of the biggest towns in the country is so lacking in high-level football clubs.

We have a strong amateur scene. But how much better would our overall football scene be if we had another club pushing to get into the Conference, if not the Football League, like Ramsbottom United are striving to do?

I am not suggesting all the clubs should pool their resources, work with the council to provide a 3,000-seater stadium in Great Lever and give Bolton a second club to rival the several around Manchester.

But it would be nice and I guarantee they would get big coverage in this newspaper – especially when they are being highlighted on television for one of those wonderful non-league giant-killings the town of Bolton has never had.