Bolton Wanderers keen on transfer swoop for Hull City defender | OneFootball

Matty Jacob is on Steven Schumacher's transfer radar

Bolton Wanderers have their sights set on Hull City left-back Matty Jacob in a bid to strengthen their back-line.

Steven Schumacher's first full window in charge at the Toughsheet Community Stadium is going to be a very important one.

For the latter half of last season, he worked with a squad that he had barely any input on, and they failed to finish inside the top six after two successive seasons of play-off finishes under Ian Evatt.

He's admitted that he's going to take a thorough and analytical approach to recruitment, just the same as he has throughout his entire career in management, and the first major target they are after has been revealed as Hull's 24-year-old defender.

Bolton Wanderers keen on Hull City defender Matty Jacob

Jacob is a target for Wanderers this summer, according to the Bolton News.

The left-footer has two years left on his contract and is the type of player - a full-back - that Schumacher is currently short of; the only other one of those currently on Bolton's books is 21-year-old Max Conway.

Starting appearances in the Championship have been a rarity over the past two seasons for Jacob, who came through the Tigers' academy system.

He's made 22 total appearances in the second tier following a loan spell with non-league side Gateshead in 2021. He was a regular on the bench for Ruben Selles before he was sacked by Hull.

Schumacher has previously admitted that he wants to add experience to his squad, as well as recruit more players that will suit his preferred back-four system, which wasn't suited to the composition of Bolton's squad because of the years of signings made under Evatt, who used three central defenders.

"We do need to bring in youth, excitement, energy, but also experience and know-how about how to get out of this division, so we’ll assess both areas," said the Wanderers boss, via the Bolton News.

There's the potential to be a delay in any deal for Jacob, though, as Hull are yet to appoint Selles' replacement. Sergej Jakirovic is expected to be brought in to take over at the MKM Stadium, and he may want time to look over the squad and assess who he needs and who can leave.

Bolton Wanderers shouldn't spend over the odds to bring in Matty Jacob

One positive about this news for Bolton supporters is that the club are clearly still willing to spend transfer fees on their targets.

They will need to offer Hull some money in order to bring Jacob to the Toughsheet this summer. How much they should offer for the 24-year-old is debatable.

Schumacher's recruiting process is detailed, as mentioned, so they must have spotted something in his fairly limited game time with the Tigers.

But there's not a lot of data to go off to assess how successful he could be in a Bolton shirt. It's certainly a case of trusting the head coach and his recruitment team's instincts.