Substitute Gideon Kodua snatched a draw with an 83rd minute strike, triggering a grandstand finish to the game where the Hatters laid siege to the Bolton goal.
They could not find the killer blow against 10 men, however, and remain in seventh spot, a point and a place below Wanderers in the League One table.
Beaten 5-0 by Barnsley the previous weekend, Luton had bounced back with a win against Huddersfield Town in midweek. And Wilshere was happy enough to add another point, having seen Bolton dominate in the first half of the game,
“I think we deserved it actually,” he told Luton Today. “I thought we took a while to get going, we were playing against a good team, so they make some nice rotations and cause you some problems we had to solve. I thought we could have maybe solved them a little bit quicker and then they score in that moment which is a bit of a punch in the head, but we responded well.
“Then once we solved what they were trying to do in the build-up, I thought we had some success. We definitely have to have one penalty, probably two penalties in the first half, so probably after the week, the context of the week, how big it’s been and how important it’s been, the five-nil and then to comeback and all the energy we had to put into the game and then recover and go again against one of the best teams in the league, I think I’m happy with the week.
“We probably saw a team that are one of the best in the league, closer to a Championship side and the level in the Championship is they have threats everywhere, so I felt like we solved it pretty well after their goal. I know the context is different now they’re protecting something but once we did solve it, we created some moments in the first half, we had the best opportunities after that in my opinion.
“The message at half time was about believing, we have to believe that we can win this game as we’ve created so many good moments and I definitely saw that in the second half. I know they went down to 10 men, but even when they had 11 men, I felt like we were building into the game, we were creating opportunities, one of them just has to go in. We have to score a set-piece at some point, but overall I’m happy.”