Allardyce hails Bolton's
battling heroes
Mitch Phillips
Bolton Wanderers manager Sam Allardyce heaped praise on his "heroic" players on Wednesday after they beat Manchester United at Old Trafford for the second season running.
Kevin Nolan, a scorer in last October's 2-1 premier league success, did the damage again with the game's only goal 14 minutes from time as United's unconvincing start to the season continued.
"It's like last year but even better, two years on the trot is unheard of for a club like ours," Allardyce told Sky Sports television.
"Sometimes you can always do something a little bit special and I think we've done that over the last two seasons now.
"We are delighted, the players should be very proud. Towards the end the onslaught by United was tremendous but there was some heroic defending and finally the saves by the goalkeeper.
"It was a fantastic three points."
United manager Alex Ferguson said the result showed "what the premier league is all about".
"In a period when we had been looking sound defensively we made a slight error and lost the game," he said.
"After that we absolutely pounded them and were unlucky not to score."
SPURS SHOCKER
Fulham were also celebrating after their fightback from 2-0 down to beat Tottenham Hotspur 3-2 at Loftus Road, with Sylvain Legwinski hitting the winner deep into injury time.
"It was a perfect pass and I just waited until the last minute," he said.
"We did not give up and it paid off for us," added the Frenchman, whose winner came after goals by Junichi Inamoto and Steed Malbranque.
Spurs boss Glenn Hoddle, whose team looked set to go back to the top of the league after an impressive first half, had no real complaints about his first defeat of the season.
"We were left wanting in the second half and all credit to Fulham, they played well," Hoddle said.
Liverpool also threw away a 2-0 lead to draw 2-2 at home with promoted Birmingham City -- the Anfield side's third successive 2-2 draw.
"It's a shame for the players really, we had a lot of chances to finish these games off," said Liverpool boss Gerard Houllier.
"It is a bit of a setback and we are a bit knocked down but I know my players have the mental strength to overcome that adversity and now we have to look at the next game."
SHARP LEEDS
Clinton Morrison got both Birmingham goals, the second in injury time, to leave manager Steve Bruce beaming.
"It's quite incredible -- the last time we came to Merseyside a couple of weeks ago that happened to us when Everton sneaked a draw against us," Bruce said.
"But we showed an honesty and a spirit and we played some good stuff tonight and I'm delighted."
Leeds United endured something of a battering at Newcastle United but won 2-0 with an early goal by Mark Viduka and a late one by Alan Smith.
Manager Terry Venables said his players had been excellent.
"We started a lot sharper, everyone did well," he said.
"The last couple of games we started poorly, tonight we made sure we didn't do that. We set our stall out and did a lot better."
Smith, who scored for England on Saturday, added: "It's massive for us. It was a difficult game to come here."
Newcastle are now second-last with just one win to their name but manager Bobby Robson said he had little to complain about.
"We will play worse than that and win games 2-0 this season," he said.
