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Two of our writers join the debate which has been troubling Wanderers fans all season: Would Bolton have been relegated if they had gone further in the Uefa Cup?

YES, says Neil Bonnar

IT was disappointing to see the weakened side Wanderers turned out in Lisbon.

But, in the long run, getting knocked out of the UEFA Cup was the best thing that could have happened.

Bolton boss Gary Megson said on Tuesday that resting his big players in Europe was probably the key factor that kept Wanderers in the Premier League, and I agree with him.

Sure Bolton could well have reached the quarter-finals had Andy O'Brien, Ivan Campo, El-Hadji Diouf and Matt Taylor played in that second leg against Sporting instead of being left at home.

But the negative impact a longer run in Europe could have had on the club's relegation fight was potentially crippling.

That's no consolation to the fans who paid a fortune to follow the Whites all over Europe.

They and the many thousands back at home had every right to demand Wanderers took the competition seriously and fielded their strongest team.

But what if Gary Megson had pandered to public demand instead of doing what he thought was the right thing?

What would have happened next is, of course, pure conjecture. But so is how far Wanderers would have gone in the competition had, indeed, they got through in Lisbon.

What we do know is that firstly, everyone in football says playing in Europe harms your league form and, secondly, Wanderers stayed up.

Ipswich finished fifth in 2001 when their manager, George Burley, won the manager of the year.

The next season they had the distraction of the UEFA Cup, including a glorious 1-0 victory over Inter Milan, and got relegated.

To this day they blame their change in fortunes on being in Europe, and they haven't been back in the Premiership since.

Also, let's get some perspective about exactly how weak that Wanderers team was in Lisbon.

The populist theory is that it was full of second stringers. But Gary Cahill, Danny Guthrie and Jlloyd Samuel all played the full 90 minutes, and all went on to figure prominently in the successful survival run-in.

Jussi Jaaskelainen had the back injury which ended his season, and Megson says Kevin Nolan, Kevin Davies and Ricardo Gardner were also injured.

So the only players who in Megson's eyes were fit enough to play but didn't were Andy O'Brien, Campo, Diouf and Taylor.

It was still a controversial decision, and one that didn't pay off when a full-strength team was hopeless in defeat at Wigan three days later.

But the long-term effects of eradicating the European distraction probably helped them achieve at least the one point that separated them from the relegation zone at the end.

NO, says Liam Chronnell

OF course Wanderers could have progressed in Europe and stayed in the Premier League.

If anyone needs proof that a team with a similar sized squad can compete on more than one front then you only need to look at last night's UEFA Cup losers Rangers.

Rangers were on for a quadruple and the extra fixtures from not one, but three cup competitions does not appear to have done them any harm.

Everyone accepts the Premiership is a far higher standard than its Scottish counterpart, but Walter Smith had no hesitation in putting out his best side in all competitions.

The Rangers boss even admitted this week he was surprised the Ibrox outfit had reached the final, stating the UEFA Cup was not something he thought the Glasgow giants could win.

But at no point did he deliberately field under-strength teams. While Gary Megson should be praised for his sterling efforts in keeping Wanderers in the Premiership after Sammy Lee's ill-fated reign, his policy to rest his top players in Europe was less commendable.

On that fateful night in Lisbon, against what was generally accepted as an unimpressive Sporting side there for the taking and a place in the quarter-finals up for grabs, Megson left behind seven first-team regulars ahead of Bolton's must-win game at Wigan.

And what happened in that must-win game? They lost.

It is difficult to believe that had Nolan, Davies, Gardner (all injured but sufficiently recovered by the weekend), O'Brien, Campo, Diouf and Taylor played, that Wanderers would not have won and travelled to the JJB on a high and full of confidence.

Just look at what happened when they returned from earlier exploits on the continent. Needing to win to progress, Wanderers triumphed 1-0 at Red Star Belgrade. Three days later they hammered Wigan 4-1.

And let's just say they did reach the last eight in what would have been a possible Battle of Britain showdown - not to mention a money-spinning payday to boost the club's transfer coffers - with Rangers. A quick look at the fixture list shows us that game would have been held on April 3. Surely then, given they were not hampered by their exertions in Europe, the Whites would have been fresh and raring to go the following weekend - except they were thrashed 4-0 at Aston Villa.

The reason Wanderers stayed up is simple: they produced a Herculean effort when it really mattered, winning three out of five games in an unbeaten end to the season.

There's nothing to suggest that they would not have done that had they reached the quarter-finals, semi-finals or, if one dares to dream, the final itself. To think Wanderers could have been taking on Zenit St Petersburg at the City of Manchester Stadium last night is, admittedly, fanciful, but doing so and avoiding relegation were by no means mutually exclusive.

10:20am Thursday 15th May 2008

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