PHIL Parkinson has warned Wanderers to be on guard – or Coventry City will rain on their parade.

Weather has been anything but Sky Blue in Bolton and after rain affected his training plans, the Whites boss admits he is unsure what shape his opponents will be in at the Macron tonight.

Marvin Sordell leads the line for Coventry, returning to Bolton just over two years since his flop £3.2million move came to an end.

But while Parkinson knows all about the striker, who has rejuvenated his career at the Ricoh Arena with six goals this season, he less confident predicting what affect the weekend’s 4-1 defeat at Oxford will have on Mark Venus’s side.

“I saw them play against Scunthorpe and they played well – they should have had at least a point from that game,” he told The Bolton News. “You wouldn’t have really guessed which team was at the top that day - that was me and Steve’s (Parkin) assessment.

“They beat Morecambe Tuesday and then went to Oxford and had a terrible 45 minutes. They played a lot better second half and changed the shape.

“It’s two-fold, it has to dent their confidence to a certain degree but it might also bring on a bit of resilience as well.

“We need to make sure that their confidence stays dented and that will only happen if we approach the game in the same way we did against Millwall.”

Wanderers will be without the injured David Wheater and suspended Liam Trotter, and could bring Tom Thorpe back into the side.

But the ever-meticulous Whites boss had to adapt his preparations because of the icy winds and rain which swept across the area yesterday – prompting a call to arms on the eve of the game.

“The weather has made it more difficult,” he said. “We’ve done a few things on how we think Coventry might play but after a defeat it’s sometimes difficult to second guess them.

“We tend to do more work on the DVD footage, which is quite handy when the rain is pouring down and the wind is whipping round Lostock.

“To have them stood out there for ages would be counter-productive.

“But I have been pleased we dealt with the couple of setbacks that came our way of late, they are always going to happen in football.”