Kevin Nolan has criticised El-Hadji Diouf, his Bolton Wanderers team-mate, and vowed not to leave the club in the event of relegation. Diouf will play at the Reebok Stadium for the final time today after revealing that he wants to move on in the summer.

Nolan is unhappy with the Senegal forward for making public his plans to jump ship. The Bolton captain insists that he will remain at the club he has served for nine years even if Gary Megson, the manager, loses his battle to keep them in the Barclays Premier League, and remains hopeful that Diouf will have a rethink.

“It probably wasn't the right time for him to say those things,” Nolan said. “It's not something the fans or the players want to hear when you are fighting relegation. But if that is how he feels then he goes. Hopefully if we stay up he will have a change of mind.

“I'm happy. I've always said that I'll never submit a transfer request and I stand by that. If we go down I'm not going to put in a transfer request.”

Bolton must beat Sunderland, who confirmed their safety last week, to avoid dropping into the bottom three before the final game of the season, away to Chelsea, and Nolan says that the pressure of a season-long battle against relegation has left him drained. The 25-year-old used to be able to relax in his role as assistant manager of Nicosia, the Liverpool-based Sunday league team, but he has been forced to give that up to concentrate on preserving Bolton's top-flight status. “It was tough trying to manage my life and get to the games,” he said.

Megson is confident that Bolton can use today's 5.15pm start against Sunderland to their advantage. “Kicking off at that time may alter the atmosphere in the ground,” he said. “If results go our way elsewhere and we're playing for three points to put ourselves in a really strong position, great. But it won't alter the fact that we still have to beat Sunderland.”