Wanderers unfortunately came out second best against ten-man Birmingham City on a disappointing night at Macron Stadium on Tuesday.
Former Bolton loanee Lukas Jukiewicz got on the scoresheet in the 40th minute and that proved to be the difference between the two sides.
The Trotters were given hope when Che Adams was handed a straight red card midway through the second half, but they were unable to engineer a way back into the tie as two penalty shouts were waved away by the referee Oliver Langford.
And speaking after the match, manager Phil Parkinson gave his thoughts…
On the game as a whole…
It was always going to be a tight match. First of all, it was disappointing to concede from a set play.
We probably had the best moments in the first half. Games at this stage of the season are always going to be separated by detail.
I thought we had a decent period for ten minutes when Birmingham went down to ten men in the second half.
Jan [Kirchhoff] came on and pulled his hamstring. We did have a period when we were disjointed and it wasn’t clear to everybody that Jan had pulled his hamstring and we maybe should have brought him off.
We had enough possession and got into enough areas, but we just couldn’t find that moment of quality tonight to unlock the door or put the ball in the back of the net.
On the Whites' two penalty shouts…
I’ve only seen the first one and it’s a definite penalty - I can’t believe the referee didn’t give that.
Birmingham got a penalty against Ipswich on Saturday, which was never a penalty, and that won them the game.
Tonight, they had the rub of the green. Maybe in the last six games, things might go for us. It was certainly a very tough call not to get.
On squad unity for the run-in…
We’ve come a long way as a group, both the players and staff. We’re going to fight tooth and nail in these last six games.
When you get beat at home, you’ve got to accept an element of criticism. We’ve got to stand strong together.
Now the aim in the last six games is to give absolutely everything we’ve got and show real courage and desire.
I don’t have to tell you how tight it is at the bottom – everyone can see the table for themselves. We always said we wanted to give ourselves a chance after the terrible start we had. We’re still in with a very good chance.
I’ve got a lot of belief in this group of players that we can retain our Championship status. We’ve got to be ready for one almighty battle.
And finally, on Saturday’s trip to Derby County…
We’ve got a couple of days now to regroup as a squad and get together.
We’ll have to think carefully about picking a team which we feel will get us a result.