RARELY in the proud 125-year history of Bolton Wanderers have supporters looked forward to a new season with greater excitement and expectation writes Gordon Sharrock

Premiership football is bigger and better than ever and the boys from the Reebok will be there in the thick of it.

There is nothing new in the spine-tingling encounters to come, of course. They have spent three of the last seven seasons taking on the elite.

The difference this time is that, having survived so heroically and against all the odds last season, they now have some of the most respected talents in the world to help them.

In Youri Djorkaeff and Jay Jay Okocha - outstanding internationals - Sam Allardyce will have at his disposal two of the most creative forces in the game.

Add to that two of the most promising young talents in Europe - Bulent Akin and Bernard Mendy - plus the prospect of Delroy Facey following in Michael Ricketts' footsteps and these are truly exciting times.

Even the manager himself admits he cannot wait for the season to start, just like the fans. And, just like the fans, he has his expectations. In fact, no Bolton supporter has higher hopes for the club than the manager himself.

Big Sam has worked the oracle since he arrived in October, 1999, but he needs no-one to tell him that the greater the achievement, the greater the demands. Supporters always want more and that becomes a burden. But in Wanderers' case, the only pressure that counts is that which the manager puts on himself and his players to improve on last season. And that means more than just struggling to avoid the drop.

Allardyce is desperate to see Wanderers fulfil what he sees as their potential, establish themselves as a force in the top flight and equal, or even eclipse, the achievements of some of the great teams in the club's history.

That would be going some, considering the feats of the Twenties and Fifties, but he has set the challenge and any pressure that has been generated is of his own making.

He set the ball of expectation rolling when he defied the critics by steering Wanderers out of the doldrums three years ago. Three semi-finals in his first season and promotion in his second was head-spinning stuff but, still not content, he raised the bar even higher when he started to entice international stars -- the likes

of Bruno N'Gotty, Fredi Bobic and Stig Tofting. But it was the signing of Djorkaeff which took Wanderers on to another plane. The former Monaco and Inter ace, who won the World Cup and European Championships with France in 1998 and 2000, is a legend. The adulation he attracted in Italy during the pre-season tour proved he is still a sporting Pied Piper.

But "The King", as he was known in Milan, is just as big a hit with the players as he is with the fans.

When he left for the World Cup, having played a major part in helping Wanderers beat the drop, Djorkaeff promised that, if the club meant business and were prepared to invest in more quality players, he would seriously consider re-signing. That he duly returned, following the arrival of Okocha and Akin, shows what he thinks of the Nigerian playmaker and the Turkish midfielder and suggests he is confident he will not be fighting a losing battle. It also sent out a message that Allardyce has no intention of being a one-hit Premiership wonder.

Djorkaeff and Co join a squad featuring the tried and trusted Per Frandsen and Paul Warhurst and the developing talents of Michael Ricketts, Ricardo Gardner and Kevin Nolan, of whom great things are expected after last season.

Wanderers need to be more potent in attack than last time when they drew too many games they should have won and lost others that could have been drawn. Allardyce is still searching for another top striker, but he has gone a long way to addressing that particular problem. Defensively, he will again rely on experience with N'Gotty, Gudni Bergsson, Mike Whitlow and Simon Charlton the regulars in front of Jussi Jaaskelainen.

The doubters are out in force again, although this time no-one is tipping them to actually finish bottom.

Everyone expects it to be harder but without having huge sums to spend on transfer fees, Wanderers have done as well as they possibly could to strengthen their squad. In terms of numbers, they have never approached a Premiership season in a better position. But it is the quality that sets today's squad apart.