WANDERERS club chaplain Phil Mason has sent a special message of thanks to the Wanderers staff for pulling together during an uncertain time.

As Neil Lennon’s side prepare for a relegation six-pointer against Rotherham United, Mason has issued a reminder to supporters that the Whites have successfully overcome some difficult obstacles at various stages of their history.

And with the financial crisis still hanging heavy over the Macron, he has called for everyone to pull together once again.

“We have been going through some of the most challenging days in our club’s recent history and I can only testify to the incredible resilience of the staff at the club who have kept going through this difficult time,” he writes in a special message in tomorrow’s club programme.

“A number of occasions during these times, staff, players and fans have said to me “We have a club with a great history and we must keep on going”.

“Our history is full of great moments, including being and founding member of the Football League, the first club to score a league goal, the first club to score a goal at Wembley and, with the passion of our captain Harry Gosling, the club that signed up all it players to go and serve in World War Two. That is all before we begin looking at the great Nat Lofthouse and some great FA Cup runs of the past including the win of 1958.

"Then we remember the days of Super John McGinlay, our one and only Tony Kelly along with the more recent days of Premier League and European action.

“We are indeed a club with a great history. However, history also reminds us of other challenging times that we have faced in the past.

“It was in 1874 that Christ Church FC began under the direction of the Revd Joseph Farrell-Wright. It was only three years down the line when there was a fall out of the committee and their home pitch was lost. Every week they had to move for place to place before securing a new ground and became Bolton “Wanderers”.

“Later this year we will be remembering the tragic events of the Burnden Park Disaster 70 years on, when 33 people lost their lives.

“From 1958 -1995 we have a history of a few highs but many lows including at the end of the 1986–87 season suffering relegation to the Fourth Division for the first time in our history.

“Supporters have rallied and got behind the club many times including the development of the Lifeline Lottery that still is a vital “life line” for club today in ways that very few people realise, giving vital money to develop and support the work of the club.

“We do have a great history but within that history we learn of previous tough days when we pulled through, learned from those experience and became better for it.

“History is on our side as we look to the future together.”