English FA Premiership/Bolton Wanderers 2 West Brom 0: As penalties go, the roles played by Geoff Horsfield and Diomansy Kamara here yesterday may not be chiselled into the annals like the comedy of errors performed by Robert Pires and Thierry Henry 24 hours earlier, but West Bromwich Albion, unlike Arsenal, were unable to appreciate the black humour.

Albion manager Bryan Robson was struggling to see anything remotely funny about the chain of events that led to this defeat.

In terms of possession and territorial advantage, Bolton deserved to take the three points courtesy of Hidetoshi Nakata's first goal for the club and a second in stoppage-time from Kevin Nolan, the game's outstanding player. Sam Allardyce's team could reflect on half a dozen opportunities to score before finishing with two goals in the final 10 minutes.

Equally, Robson was entitled to wonder what might have been had his two strikers not contrived to make such a pig's ear of the 18th-minute penalty awarded by Mike Dean for El Hadji Diouf's clumsy trip on Kamara.

As Kamara was shaping up to face Jussi Jaaskelainen, Horsfield suddenly appeared just over his left shoulder in premature anticipation of a rebound, bursting into the penalty area before the kick had been taken.

Kamara sent Jaaskelainen the wrong way, but Dean ordered a retake and the delay and confusion had an adverse effect on the penalty-taker. Kamara took hold of the ball again but this time he did not look so self-assured. Trying to pick out the top corner, he succeeded only in wafting his shot horribly over the upright.

Robson was unimpressed but he reserved most of his ire for Dean. The referee, said Robson, had "won the game for Bolton" by awarding the free-kick from which Nakata scored with a low, curling shot into the bottom corner. "The referee lost us the game; that decision was a joke," Robson said.