Bolton Wanderers boss Gary Megson has sympathy for predecessor Sammy Lee.

"Last season it was all about trying to do a salvage operation and pick up from a poor start," said Megson. "The squad was simply not strong enough to support good results all the way through.

"For 18 months it hadn't been capable of beating teams in the top half of the table with the exception of Man United and West Ham.

"It must have been remarkably difficult for Sammy in his first managerial experience because of Big Sam's (Sam Allardyce) shadow," he added.

"If you look at things as a wheel - the hub was Sam, the spokes were the staff and the rim was the players. If you take away the hub and most of the spokes, a lot of things collapse."