English Premier League Week 11 Preview: Spurs Try To Stay Flying At Bolton

Fresh off of lighting Europe afire with a scintillating performance over Inter Milan on Tuesday in UEFA Champions League play, Tottenham Hotspur gets back into league play with a trip to Reebok Stadium for a match-up with Bolton Wanderers. Despite being praised for days on end, Spurs have hardly been world beaters in Premier League play, winning three, losing two and drawing one in their last six league matches. Spurs still sit fifth in the table on 15 points, two behind fourth place Manchester City so their league position isn't poor at all, but they will have to find a way to turn spectacular play in Europe to spectacular play in England. Making it all the more difficult for Tottenham on Saturday will be the absence of Rafael Van der Vaart, who is out with a hamstring injury that knocked him out at halftime on Tuesday. Aaron Lennon is also unlikely to play with a hamstring injury of his own, adding two plays to Spur' already long list of injuries.

Tottenham shines in London and all about Europe, but tucked away further north in England is Bolton, who is having a pretty good start to the season for themselves. Sitting 11th in a bunched up table, Bolton can't complain too much about their standing, but they do have just one league win since August 21. The team couldn't be too happy about their preview two matches, a 1-1 draw to Wigan and home loss to Liverpool so now with another home match up versus Spurs, they will be looking to pick up three points. Bolton are relatively healthy with Martin Petrov available after missing last week's match, but Matt Taylor's good run of form may keep him off of the field even with his return to healthy.

Projected Lineup, Bolton: Jaaskelainen, Steinsson, Cahill, Knight, Robinson, Lee, Muamba, Holden, Taylor, Davies, Elmander.

Key Battle: Matthew Taylor vs. Alan Hutton. Even as Spurs played magnificently against Inter Milan, they gave away chances because Hutton continued to struggle defending on the right. On top of that, William Gallas and he don't play too well together so when attackers beat Hutton, it's not unusual for Gallas to be late coming over to help out. Bolton will need Taylor to make an impact going forward and attack Hutton because the Spurs defense can be had if he has a good match on the left.

Pick: Spurs are riding high, but they are likely to rotate in some new players to keep everyone fresh. Bolton finds an early goal and puts Spurs down early, as has been the case often this season, but Luka Modric equalizes just before the half and Roman Pavlyuchenko poaches a second half winner for Spurs, 2-1.