I CANNOT believe Bolton Wanderers legend Nat Lofthouse was missed off the new Wembley's 'wall of fame' — which lists every England player's debut since 1872.

FA chiefs have apologised for the mistake and have vowed to correct it as soon as possible.

What makes this error all the more galling is that it has taken six months for anyone to notice.

It is only because Wanderers fan David Irving pointed out the gaffe — and then this newspaper told football chiefs — that anything is being done.

Ironically, the glaring omission came to light in the same week that Wayne Rooney broke the all-time scoring record for England — a title Nat briefly held when he scored his 30th and final goal for his country in 1958.

There has been some debate this week over whether Rooney can truly be called an England great. For my money he can.

There can't be another country in the world that would even question whether their all-time top scorer sits among the best players in their history.

Nat certainly deserves to be counted among the best. His goal scoring record for England was 30 in 33 — the best goals to games ration among the country's top scorers.

Rooney took 107 games to reach the 50 mark — imagine how many 'Sir Nat' would have scored had he played that many times for his country.

Our own chief football writer Marc Iles this week wrote about former Whites captain Kevin Davies, who has announced his retirement from professional football.

While nationally people were debating whether Rooney could be counted as one of England's best, Marc asked whether Super Kev should go down in history as a Whites legend.

His emphatic answer was 'yes' — and I couldn't agree more.

Nat is clearly, historically, our talisman. And of course, those who, like me, grew up watching the Bruce Rioch team of the 1990s will know that John McGinlay also deserves his place in Wanderers hall of fame.

But while Super Kev's goal scoring record (85 goals in an impressive 407 appearances) comes nowhere near that of McGinlay or Lofthouse, his service to the club over 10 years — which saw us go from Premier League survivors to top six regulars plus European campaigns, a League Cup final and and FA Cup semi-final— shows just how much he contributed.

Davies was our leader on and off the pitch. An old-school centre forward feared by defenders. His form for Bolton even earned him an England call-up — no mean feat for a player who was down and out on his luck when Big Sam took him on trial in 2003.

It is fitting that Davies was used as the model when Nat's statue was made — they both deserve their legend status.