PHIL Parkinson has dropped a heavy hint that Wanderers are looking at alternative options to long-time target Charlie Wyke.

After competing with Sunderland for the Bradford City striker all summer, an ill-timed knee injury appears to have forced the club into widening their search for attacking reinforcements.

Ipswich Town’s Joe Garner is one of the players thought to interest the Bolton boss, who admitted he wants TWO more front men before the close of the loan window on August 31.

Feelers were put out for a loan striker earlier in the summer, with Wolves' Spanish youngster Rafa Mir - who has since signed for Las Palmas - one of the options investigated.

Parkinson has declined to address Wyke’s individual situation and is content to leave the matter in the hands of his chairman, Ken Anderson, who was handed a shortlist of potential candidates in May.

“I’ve never mentioned specific player and people have talked about what is first choice, second choice, but realistically, we need to progress quickly and we need strength in that department,” he told The Bolton News.

“In every interview I have done this season I have said the chairman is speaking to other clubs. But unfortunately these things take time. It is frustrating.

“Strikers are hard to get. No-one wants to sell them. But we are working towards sorting it – and I think we need two.”

By Parkinson’s own estimation, Wanderers’ squad is still five players short of where it needs to be, and the feeling of concern among supporters was ramped up with a 3-1 friendly defeat at non-league Guiseley on Tuesday night.

The manager says there have been complications in getting some of his deals over the line, including an unavoidable delay in securing ex-Sunderland and Stoke City man Marc Wilson to a 12-month deal this week.

“I can’t do it any faster than I am doing,” he said.

“I am trying to get additions in. I think Marc Wilson is a good signing – a versatile player who covers a lot of positions.

“That could have been done a couple of weeks ago but unfortunately he had a family bereavement and had to go back to Ireland, and I have been keeping in touch with him.”