Bolton manager Gary Megson believes his side are shooting themselves in the foot in their attempt to stay in the Premier League - but is adamant Nicolas Anelka would not have provided the ammunition to fire them to safety.
Wanderers have lost five straight league games since beating Reading at the Madejski Stadium on February 2 - a run that has seen them drop into the relegation zone, two points from safety.
They have scored only twice in that sequence and Megson believes it is that lack of ruthlessness in front of goal that is costing Bolton dear.
A quick scan of his teamsheet for the latest setback, a 2-0 defeat at Manchester United on Wednesday night, would have been enough to confirm Megson's fears when he fielded a starting XI featuring only two players - Kevin Davies and El Hadji Diouf - who have scored in the Premier League this season.
Since Anelka played his last game for Wanderers before moving to Chelsea, a 1-0 win over Derby on January 2, their only league win came against the Royals.
In the nine games that have followed the Frenchman's departure, Bolton have found the net only five times, but Megson has dismissed the link between his sale and Bolton's slump in form.
"Everybody's now saying that if we'd have kept him then we'd have done this or that," Megson said.
"But when I arrived I think Nic had scored five or six goals and we were bottom of the table by one point from Derby, so it doesn't follow that if he'd stayed then we'd have done differently.
"We had no choice, Nic wanted to go and join Chelsea, which we fully understood.
"This club has never scored lots of goals, but I do accept that we don't score enough goals at the moment to get ourselves out of the trouble that we're in.
"It's not something that we hope changes - it's got to change."
If Bolton can find their shooting boots, however, Megson is sure they are good enough to beat the drop.
"There's no magic pill you can take," he said.
"Morale is high because they know that what we're not doing at the moment is scoring when we're on top, and that will make a massive difference to us if we can sort that side of things out.
"In quite a few games we've had the upper hand and not scored. We've only got ourselves to blame and you must score goals when you're in the ascendancy."
Megson added: "You can't do much about it other than hope it changes by virtue of time or the amount of opportunities you get to score.
"It's like a golfer practising his putting or a snooker player potting balls, it's entirely different when, as it was the other night (at Old Trafford), there are 70,000 people watching.
"We're creating chances and we're missing too many, and when you're doing that you end up where we are at the moment."
Bolton begin their eight-game salvage mission against Manchester City at the Reebok Stadium on Saturday, when Megson is hopeful skipper Kevin Nolan (back) and defender Gary Cahill (bruised foot) will be ready to return.
The Wanderers boss takes comfort from the fact he has already lifted his team away from the foot of the table once this season and he sees no reason why the same trick cannot be repeated.
"When I arrived after 10 games everybody was looking at the Championship and it was all doom and gloom," he recalled.
"Things change as your results change and there's got to be a realisation that it can also change the other way again, and we've got to try to get ourselves back into the pack and then push on from here."
