Japan calls after Anderton show

Nor was he a million miles from Anderton's well-struck penalty which opened the scoring in the 21st minute after Anthony Barness was judged to have bundled Anderton over. By then it was already clear a potential rout was on the cards.

Ten minutes before half-time Anderton sprinted to the byline to retrieve the ball and cross to Iversen in one startling touch. Iversen knew what to do to make it 2-0.

Then, just before the break, Poyet muffed a wonderful chance. Having done the hard part by dancing past Gudni Bergsson, he pushed the ball against the post.

Not to worry. After 56 minutes a shot from Anderton - him again - had such sting that Jaaskelainen could only parry it into the path of Matthew Etherington, who scored his first goal for Spurs.

By then Hoddle had moved down to the bench from his place in the stand, although presumably it was not worry that drove him there. Bolton crowned their nightmare with an own goal, officially credited (or rather debited) to Barness, although some eyes saw Ricardo Gardner as the guilty party.

That Bolton were resigned to their fate was signalled much earlier by the substitution of Michael Ricketts with half an hour remaining, presumably to conserve his strength for his team's efforts to avoid the drop. But if Bolton indeed plummet through the trapdoor come May, as they must on last night's horrendous form, then surely some top club will snap up Jaaskelainen. Until then, however, he is condemned to a wretched existence.

Bolton have now won but a single match in their last 14 outings, and that lone victory was in the third round of the FA Cup over Stockport, not exactly team of the year. Last night's flaccid display looked even ghastlier bearing in mind that their Premiership away form is significantly better than at the Reebok.

Statistically, they are more than twice as likely to score away than at home, a mind-boggling fact on this evidence. They looked significantly more likely to sprout wings and fly than get on the scoresheet. Little wonder manager Sam Allardyce could not face discussing his misery.

By contrast, Spurs did not so much underline their status as an excellent cup side, but rather lit it in neon. The nuclear holocaust of injury which has laid waste to their defence scarcely made any impact.

Further, thanks to Anderton's utter supremacy, Spurs were less affected than they might have been by Teddy Sheringham's enforced tenure of the substitutes' bench (Better to leave him there than risk a fifth yellow card of the season and have him miss the Worthington Cup Final).

If only Tottenham can crack the code which is preventing them consistently reproducing such form in the Premiership, then they will not have to rely on cup competitions for a place in Europe.

As Hoddle said, that may take time. But as Anderton is proving, good things come to those who wait.