Bolton Wanderers 0-0 Leicester City

From everything we heard about Dougie Freedman prior to him accepting the Bolton Wanderers job, it seemed like he was a man that liked to use the whole of his squad. Needless to say, it was slightly more than surprising when he trotted out the same side that beat Cardiff City at the weekend with the exception of David Ngog missing the match through suspension.

For the first 40 minutes of the match, Bolton Wanderers took the brunt of Leicester City's attack. Shot after shot forced excellent saves out of Adam Bogdan, one after the other. Leicester City hit six shots on target in the first half with Adam Bogdan getting in the way of each one.

The second half was more of a different story as Bolton Wanderers once again found their feet after the break. The Trotters forced goalkeeper Kasper Schmeichel into a number of saves, many from close range. It was Mark Davies doing most of the shooting for Bolton while Kevin Davies did his usual flick-on party trick. Bolton and Leicester City would both fail to beat the respective opposition's goalkeeper though and the match would end 0-0.

In truth, Bolton were largely toothless in the attack and it seemed like the chances were few and far between. The Trotters were more-or-less forced to play the long ball, which, any time past the Sam Allardyce era, has not worked. Leicester troubled the Bolton defense often though and often forced the back line and Darren Pratley to put the ball behind. At the end of the day, the Foxes were awarded 16 corners to Bolton's seven.

The important thing to take from this match though is the overwhelming positive of keeping a clean sheet. Having a zero on the opposition's side of the scoresheet is something that has been extremely rare in the world of the Whites. Bolton had kept just two league clean sheets since February 1, 2012 prior to this, a 0-0 draw at home against Arsenal. The other league clean sheet came earlier this season in August when Bolton beat Derby County 2-0.

In two games, Dougie Freedman and his 4-2-3-1 formation have allowed just one goal. In the five games before that, Bolton had given up a total of ten goals, two in each game. Bolton have also lost just one of their last five, picking up 8 points in that stretch. While it's not good enough, it's a big building block that Dougie now has a foundation to building.