Bolton manager Gary Megson has told his players to take a leaf out of Cristiano Ronaldo's book and realise dedication could be the key to their Barclays Premier League survival.
Wanderers suffered a fifth straight league defeat at Manchester United last night when the mercurial Portugal winger scored both goals - his 23rd and 24th in the top flight this season - in a 2-0 victory for the title favourites.
The second strike in particular, an unstoppable dipping free-kick from 25 yards, prompted Megson to brand Ronaldo a "genius" after the game at Old Trafford.
Few players could currently challenge the former Sporting Lisbon star in any assessment of the world's best players, but although a significant proportion of his outstanding talent is God-given, Megson believes it is his work ethic on the training ground that has seen him emerge so spectacularly from the pack.
"It (the first goal) was decent finish from Ronaldo but the second one was a marvellous strike," the Trotters boss said.
"I was speaking to the manager (Sir Alex Ferguson) afterwards and that was the reward of practice and practice and practice.
"He's out there all the time doing that and it's not a fluke - he's got this technique of taking free-kicks that's brilliant, but he works at it."
He added: "In the modern day, he's going to be as good as anybody around at the moment."
Megson was less enamoured with the opening goal which came about when Bolton failed to clear a corner.
In the build up to Ronaldo's strike, which bounced up off the turf to beat goalkeeper Ali Al Habsi, United striker Carlos Tevez attempted an overhead kick which Megson believed should have been called a foul for dangerous play.
He certainly does not think it would have been awarded if the incident had occurred at the other end and said: "The first one, I'd like to have seen that the other way around, with an overhead kick which nearly took Joey O'Brien's head off and nothing was done about it."
Despite yet another defeat Megson saw enough in the performance at Old Trafford to convince him all is not yet lost in his team's bid to beat the drop.
Wanderers are now two points shy of safety with eight matches to play and Manchester City next up at Reebok Stadium on Saturday.
And Megson is convinced a repeat of last night's second-half performance, when Bolton shut out United and created a string of chances, will give them a fighting chance against the Red Devils' city rivals.
"There was some good stuff in the first half, we had a great chance through Kevin Davies, but when you give a team of that quality a two-goal start it's going to be difficult," he said.
"The way we went about our work in the second half and the opportunities we created, we've got to make sure we pick up in the same way against City as we left off against United.
"We've got to keep that going for the rest of the season to give ourselves a chance of getting out of this."
