PARIS Maghoma is loving life at Wanderers – but Ian Evatt is not looking too far into the future with his in-form Brentford midfielder.
With four goals in his last seven games, Maghoma has been on a dazzling run for the Whites, who go to Oxford United this evening looking to record a ninth consecutive win in all competitions.
The 22-year-old is on loan for the season and Wanderers are currently confident that Premier League Brentford will not seek to recall him early in January window.
Evatt is pleased with the progress Maghoma has made and is backing him to improve further during his spell in League One, but he is shelving any talk of a permanent deal for the time being, at least.
“We seem to have this conversation about most of our loan players – we started with Marlon Fossey, then Connor Bradley and James Trafford, and now we’re doing it about Paris,” he told The Bolton News.
“He is really happy, and you can see that with his football. When they are feeling good off the pitch it becomes aligned with their on-field performance.
“We have seen him express himself and I think there is more to come from him. We had a conversation last week and he loves it here, he is really enjoying his time, and there’s no reason why that time won’t continue.
“We are delighted to have him and hopefully he can continue to keep up the performances he has been putting in of late.”
Maghoma’s silky skills have made him popular on the Wanderers terraces – and just like previous loan arrivals like Fossey, Bradley and Trafford, he has embraced life at the club.
His playing style has also filled a void which was left last January when Bolton sold Dapo Afolayan to Germany side St Pauli – a decision deemed controversial at the time, but one that Evatt feels has gradually been more accepted.
“It is funny how football changes and evolves,” he said. “We are very respectful of the journey we have been on as a team, and that I have been on as a manager. And along the way we have had some fantastic players – Dapo, for instance, was a huge player for us and he’s doing brilliantly in Germany. Nobody is happier than me to see him playing well over the there and we still stay in touch.
“But it is a marker of how the team has evolved that nobody speaks about Dapo anymore.
“Yes, we are respectful of how good he was for us, but when we lost him and those dribbling skills, the ability to drive through the middle of the pitch and beat players, all of a sudden we have got other players who can do that now. We don’t miss him as much.
“That is great credit to the players who have stepped into these big boots – the same goes for Conor and for Traff – we had to evolve as a team.
“We have evolved but there is more to come, and for me that is really exciting.”
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