I must admit I was struggling for things to talk about in this week’s blog.
I thought about discussing the weather and how I decided to walk the 3 miles to work because I couldn’t get my car up the hill.
And the ridiculous early postponement at West Ham because a small Italian weather girl called Jan Francis Zola said that Upton Park would be a dangerous place to visit on Sunday.
Dangerous perhaps if you are a Hammers fan and most of your best players are missing through injury, but Upton Park last Sunday looked like the least snow affected place in the UK!
I then thought about discussing the transfer speculation surrounding Stephen Hunt, who I would love to see at the club and Jermaine Beckford, who I wouldn’t. But let’s be honest, until something concrete happens, it does get a tad dull going over old ground.
Anyway, at 4.30pm on Thursday afternoon, my blogging saviour rang in the form of Gareth from our shirt sponsors, Sportingbet.com.
Gareth has been kind enough to invite me to a couple of things at Molineux and on this occasion, he asked me if I would like to attend the 2010 Wolves Hall of Fame that night, to honour the second batch of Wolves legends being inducted into the Hall of Fame.
He didn’t need to ask twice and a couple of hours later I found myself at the bar in Molineux having a chat with the ‘Cat’, Bert Williams.
The night started quite surreally when King John came up to me and shook my hand and introduced himself as “John Richards”. “Nathan Lloyd”, I said proudly but obviously completely pointlessly. I said to John that he really didn’t need to introduce himself as I was pretty sure that every person amongst the 300 in attendance would know who he was.
After a bite to eat, the evening was presented by Bob Hall who took us on a joyous trip down memory lane as Billy Harrison, Bert Williams, Bill Slater, Peter Broadbent, Mike Bailey, John Richards and Graham Turner were inducted into the Hall of Fame.
It was great to see the majority of the inductees had made it. Unfortunately Peter Broadbent wasn’t well enough to attend the evening, so instead his wife, Shirley, and Ron Flowers were there on his behalf.
For anybody who attended the night, they couldn’t but fail to be utterly charmed by Peter’s wife Shirley, an absolutely lovely, warm and funny lady. She told the audience how she first met Peter back at the Civic Hall in the early Fifties and really fancied him and his quiff.
She spoke passionately about her immense sense of pride as she watched the great man take to the field in an England shirt and how Stan Cullis didn’t approve of their relationship. Stan instead preferring that Peter continued sharing his double bed, situated in lodgings in Whitmore Reans, with Ron Flowers!
Wave after wave of Wolves heroes came on stage; Malcolm Finlayson, Andy Mutch, Andy Thompson, Phil Parkes, Dave Wagstaffe, Mike Stowell and Matt Murray.
We saw clips of the ‘Cat’, Bert Williams flinging himself all over the goal in a roll neck jersey, the terrier Mike Bailey leaving his mark on opposition players and putting in an incredible performance in the 1974 league cup final.
There was footage of George Best’s hero, Peter Broadbent, who wouldn’t have looked out of place in the Brazil side of 1970. There were the top flight goals scored majestically by King John and the wing wizardry of Bill Slater.
But maybe because of my age, my favourite inductee of the night was Graham Turner. I think we all know the story of how Graham took the club out of darkness and back into the light by signing players in Bully, Dennison, Thompson and Robertson that the Albion had cleverly decided to leave out with the bins.
Combine astute signings with back to back Third and Fourth Division Championships and a memorable Wembley day for 50,000 Wolves fans and Graham firmly put Wolves back on the map.
A particular highlight for me was when they showed a picture of the players from the Eighties training on the old North Bank car park complete with drain covers and tarmac, which I’m sure, many of you will fondly remember.
It is a massive shame that he didn’t complete the job of taking Wolves back into the top flight and I remember feeling quite ashamed when fans were calling for his head in the early Nineties.
Meeting Graham, King John, Mike Stowell, Matt Murray, Andy Thompson and a few of the others was a real treat. But I was on a quest to meet the head honchos of the club and I did manage to collar Jez Moxey and Steve Morgan.
Without trying to come across as too sycophantic, I chatted to Jez and said that commercially I thought he was a very astute and that perhaps he’d took a bit too much stick for the pie and pint debacle, although he deserved a bit.
I then had a word with Steve Morgan who I’d heard talking about Freddy Eastwood and how annoyed he was that everyone said he should play when Mick wouldn’t put him in the side.
I told him that I was one of those people shouting for Freddy to get a chance but that in the end I felt that Mick was justified with his decision. Steve reemphasized that Mick does have money to spend, but he wouldn’t tell me how much, no matter how long I begged!
What an absolutely incredible night; one of those events where you try and take it all in and pinch yourself that you are surrounded by Wolves gods.
I found myself telling Andy Thompson that Neil Emblem had sent me an email earlier in the day thanking me for nominating him in the team of the Noughties.
Neil also said to me that if I bump into any of the old Wolves players that I should tell them that he fancied a go in the Masters football. Little did I know that I would be relaying the message that very evening to Mike Stowell and Thommo!
The only problem with going out on a Thursday night is that it’s usually the night that I sit and write the blog. So, it’s now 4am and I’m up at 7am for work!
After the night I’ve had, going to sleep wouldn’t have happened easy anyway!
So on to the present and finally some football to talk about with the visit of Roberto Martinez’s Wigan on Saturday to Molineux.
Who knows which Wigan will turn up; hopefully for Wolves it’ll be the team that shipped five at Old Trafford and nine at White Hart Lane. Rodallega is their obvious danger man, but their defence is always susceptible to pace and Titus Bramble has the turning circle of an oil rig.
It’s the first opportunity Wolves have of doing the double over a fellow Premiership team after beating Wigan in their backyard back at the start of the campaign and a win should see us climb a couple of notches up the table.
As Bully mentioned in his column yesterday, it could be a key match for Ebanks Blake to make his mark and hopefully grab a goal from open play.
Football can be a cruel game and although Ebanks is loved at the club for scoring bags of goals in the last couple of season, if he doesn’t get some goals soon then you can only see the inevitable replacement coming through the gates in the next couple of weeks to take his place.
Players like Ebanks, Doyle, Craddock, Kightly and Stearman have their opportunity to keep this club in the top flight and who knows maybe one day, one of the current crop will be taking to the stage to be inducted into the Hall of Fame.
Have a cracking weekend. Thanks again to Gareth and Sportingbet.com and I’m off now to get a couple of hours sleep.
UTW!
@Wolvesblogger 