Steven Schumacher was left ruing the “small margins” at Wrexham – but admitted his Wanderers side ultimately didn’t do enough to win the tie.
Andy Cannon got the decisive goal 20 minutes from time as Bolton missed out on a place in the Vertu Trophy semi-final.
“Frustrating really. Obviously, disappointed to lose the game,” said Schumacher. “For the first 20 minutes, I thought we were excellent.
“We passed the ball really well and sort of went on from Saturday’s game. We played with loads of energy, but in that spell we probably needed to score. Again, just be a bit more clinical and make the most of that.
“After that, we slowed the tempo down a bit which suited them. We started complicating things and playing in front of them rather than trying to run in behind.
“The game became a little bit of a scrap. Second half, there was not much in the game but unfortunately one moment of quality was enough to win it.”
John McAtee almost got the Whites back on level terms in the final stages but his shot shaved the post.
“They are the small margins in any game between two good teams,” the head coach continued. “I just felt that in the second half it became a bit scrappy.
“We didn’t really have that energy and endeavour that we needed to really put them under pressure.
“Their four subs who came on who hadn’t played over the weekend maybe made a bit of a difference.
“The opportunity they had, it was a great finish from Cannon. A great move from us but unfortunately ours hits the post, theirs hits the post and goes in. I don’t think in the end we probably did enough to win anyway.”
The league campaign is now Wanderers’ sole focus and a trip to Shrewsbury is next up on the agenda.
“We take each game as it comes,” Schumacher insisted. “The lads had been playing well before I got here, the two games were excellent.
“The Reading game, we played well and didn’t deserve to lose. We played excellently against Crawley on Saturday.
“Today probably lacked that little bit of spark. Some of it was really good early on and after that, we just sort of fizzled out a bit.
“But it won’t go into the league and we will have a bigger squad to pick from at the weekend at Shrewsbury. Hopefully, we can put in a performance that will get us the result we want.”
The 40-year-old has now had three games in the dugout since he was named the new head coach at Wanderers.
Schumacher reckons there is room for improvement but can’t fault the effort of his squad over the past week-and-a-half.
“The lads have been good,” he reflected. “I have been here for about 10 days and been dead impressed with everyone.
“The lads have given us everything and even tonight, I think they gave everything they had but just ran out of energy a bit.
“There is no gripe from that point of view. We can improve and definitely get better, but we are also not stinking the gaff out!
“It is important that we just keep going, keep believing in each other and get that next result at the weekend.”
Nathan Baxter started between the sticks at the Racecourse Ground. The goalkeeper was charged with “misconduct” by the FA on Friday following an incident during the warm-up at Reading.
“I don’t want to go into too much detail because I don’t know whether the investigation has been concluded, but there is a potential he is going to get charged,” said Schumacher.
“I don’t know what the punishment will be but it is a mistake from Nathan really. We will deal with that, I think I will know a bit more tomorrow.”
