Norwich City boss Alex Neil has revealed his delight with Gary Hooper as the striker came off the bench to fire his side to a stoppage-time win over Bolton Wanderers.

Graham Dorrans put the Canaries ahead in the ninth minute, but they were pegged back by an equaliser from Adam le Fondre.

In the second half, Neil made the decision to bolster his team's attacking options by introducing Hooper from the bench and his faith was rewarded when the striker fired home the winner for the visitors in the 93rd minute to maintain their surge for automatic promotion.

Neil told Sky Sports News: "I was hoping it was going to come. We did everything we possibly could have done to force it to come. The one thing you know about Gary Hooper is if you give him the ball in and around the box, he is a danger and it was a fantastic finish.

"I put him on with 25 minutes to go so he had plenty of time to make an impact. Gary is always pushing for a regular start. He has started certain games and done well and maybe not done so well in other games.

"We need to try and win every remaining game. If it means I am going to throw caution to the wind and go for it and it costs us, well I would rather do that than play defensively and see out a draw which over the piece probably won't be good enough."

Norwich are second in the Championship, one point clear of the chasing pack in the final automatic promotion place.