A dazzling light show and booming pyrotechnics played out to a Stairway to Heaven soundtrack to millions of households.
…It was as if Christmas hadn’t even arrived.
Let’s pretend it was December 24 instead, and a shared name in the hat for round 4 is the present under the tree. It’s a hat that does little for our appearance, along with a ball we’ve got little use for. Some cash would have been much more useful instead.
Thankfully for Nuno, money is something he should also be expecting from Fosun, like the obligatory pound notes from the relatives, falling from the obligatory cards that you glance to read.
The gaffer needs to get spending and his team needs some help, pronto. To call it a squad would be spurious in the first place as it isn’t one. It’s a commendable, talented side plus one or two kids, which always ends each game reverting to first XI mode. It’s a clutch of 21 names on the back of a programme, featuring Jordao, Kilman, Vallejo and Cutrone – the latter two are surely off anytime soon, if they haven’t left already.
We’re not so much thin on the ground, but absolutely shot to pieces, with only Pedro Neto purchased over the summer (effectively) when we were crying out for reinforcements back then – before a Europa / Premier League advent calendar opened up, featuring 36 windows and counting.
To then play last season’s conquests over Man Utd on the video-walls before kick-off was somewhat arbitrary, as that squad was actually stronger than the one we’re working with right now, only with a fraction of the workload sapping both body and mind.
Neto is worth a mention, as his performance embodied the team’s as a whole. Very brave on the ball, always scheming and showing, but lacking in quality or composure to break down a Manchester United side who were wasting time at the death to take a replay back home. Our little Portuguese is young. We have come far.
In order to maintain the incredible position we find ourselves in, and to even gate-crash the elite that VAR is so crookedly protecting, we need some reinforcements. Otherwise, spectacles like this are the most we can hope for. It’s not that we were bad. Far from it. We just looked five or 10 per-cent off the giddy highs we’ve been spoilt with under our Bearded Wonder. Like the ones we were being reminded of on the video walls.
The worry is it’s a brooding beard, with Nuno’s haunting dark eyes demanding as much attention today as his hat-trick of first punches when we’ve won in the past. He knows those full-time festivities aren’t formalities when you’re playing five games in 12.
When Benny Ashley-Seal is picked over Cutrone, then the Italian’s days are numbered. And when looking at Leicester City – a team we aspire to catch – you can see where we’re still playing catch-up. A player in the James Maddison mould would be worth his weight in gold.
A key to open the door? A ‘target man’ to feed off the many crosses we don’t convert? An Alfred N’Diaye 2.0 to deal with Vicarage Road vigors? In short, a Plan B for spectacles like this at Molineux.
Nuno has a list of those things he wants.
An FA Cup replay won’t be on it.
Well said Ben.
Another frustrating evening of giving the ball away and not converting half chances.
It was only when the substitutes came on that we looked like a team that could actually retain the ball and look threatening.
Ashley-Seal may be the future but he certainly ISN’T the present as he was constantly barged off balls that he should have been holding up, and, when out of possession, didn’t press. He seemed to trot around the pitch rather than run.
Adama was his usual live wire self, but his crosses were not always accurate and, when they were, there was usually nobody in the box to take advantage.
I don’t want to maunder on about the shortcomings of our squad players but one thing is sure.
We need reinforcements if we are going to press for a top six place.
It seems ridiculous to whinge about things like this when you look at how far we’ve come in three seasons.
But I’m a football fan – that’s what I do.
Nuno will not be a happy bunny if some aren’t forthcoming soon.
And nor will I.
But I’ll still be sitting in The Steve Bull.
I’m a Wolves fan – that’s what we do.
Great piece apart from the reference to VAR being crooked. Leave it out, please, that one’s been done to death in Clive’s piece. Must now be the most used acronym in the English language.
I think that you and young Benjamin have said it all.
Not often I get first comment though somebody could be beating me to it even as I tap the screen.
Thomas entirely agree with your summing up as to where we are now. Our 11-14 man squad is beginning to founder. With so many games played, two of the most recent against arguably the two best teams in Europe, both with enormous squads filled with talent, shows the levels of fitness and resilience of the players.
But the demands made are beginning to take their toll. Nuno can only keep so many plates spinning for a limited period of time before they all tumble. Reinforcement is needed now if the dreams of Fosun, Nuno and his staff,the players and countless fans around the world are to be met.
Whether in a January window the quality is out there and available is debatable. We can only hope Jeff and the backroom staff have a cunning plan.
Yep. They did. Never mind…….. just type faster.
Old dogs and new tricks comes to mind Brompton
That’s not being beaten to it !
Let me give you an example about being beaten to it
This time of year is all about the agents and who gets in first
Well over the last couple of months in Wolverhampton there has been a deal being brokered , It seems as though all had gone through quite smoothly as this particular deal was between one of our fellow bloggers ( EXILE ) and the agents who were wolverhampton estate agents. The property in question is house within a two minute walk of the molineux
As the proud new owner received the key from said agent and proudly turned the key to walk into his new home … can you imagine the look on his face when he found Lord Twix in his front room waiting for the setter to arrive after taking full advantage of his new free parking . then he noticed a 240 v extension lead running through the the cat flap and into the back garden when he opened the back door and followed the lead , it went straight to a tent ! Guess who …???!!!
That’s being beaten to it !
Pmsl. I thought we said the lead led to a campervan belonging to Wolfstroker, not a tent lol. Good to see you on Saturday Matt.
Yes, it was good to catch up with you Matt in the NBB. Likewise, Witley and Shaun.
Good report. Thanks Ben, and Happy New Year to all.
I totally agree with the need to reinforce the squad, but I will go one further and draw attention to a particular attribute we need to strengthen, and that’s goal scoring. We have nobody we can bring in off the bench to make something happen out of nothing and win a game. Ironic, that the master of this was the man sitting in the opposition manager’s seat during the game.
I’ve said this before, and it still stands, that our midfielders need to have a better nose for goal. When was the last time Jonny, Moutinho, Neves or Vinagre scored a goal? Don’t get me wrong … these are all great players who I am honored and delighted that they grace our team. Their work rate and their class is what has us where we are today. But they need to score. I don’t expect them to score every game, but regularly. We can’t keep relying on Jimenez, Traore and Doc to score all the goals.
Man Utd were there for the beating yesterday … all it would have taken was one goal. They had nothing to offer. But at the end of it, neither had we. We have been going on about needing to be more clinical in front of goal since last season. Nuno needs to fix this somehow, and I know he will. And hopefully bring in the right reinforcements who can provide this ability too.
Funny how far we’ve come when we go into a game against Man Utd fully expecting to run them off the pitch, and come away disappointed when we don’t. Not too long ago we would have been all high-fives and atta-boys for holding them to a draw.
Come on Wanderers, let’s take it to the next level!
Go Wolves!
These comments are spot on. While it sounds good to promote young players, they need game time to develop and sometimes it doesn’t work so well. I thought Neto and Vinagre didn’t click together as a left wing fleet footed partnership should do. Benny was a target that fell over more often than he held the ball up. Kilman is doing well but distribution let him down last night. I’m sorry if this seems harsh but what a huge difference when Jonny, Moutinho and Jimenez appeared. Our first 11 is first rate but once they hit 50 games, the legs will start to question the brain signals.
Not just reinforcements, quality reinforcements are needed plus big Willy to finish the season well.
Apart from requiring a larger squad, yet again we played poorly in the first half and well in the second half. And I don’t buy the argument that it was because our better players came on in the second half. It is a distinct pattern for most of our games. If you take our results in the PL from the first half, we would be right in the relegation zone, and if you take our second half results we are well in the Champions league position in the table! Football is a 90 minute game,not 45 minutes. This is something Nuno has to address! It is really frustrating!
Great night under the floodlights it was not, a rout it was not, entertaining it wasn’t great, but we have come on leaps and bounds under Fosun and I believe there is even more to come. At least there was good food at the Sunbeam where we had a meal with Mr & Mrs Lowves and Mr & Mrs Newark, a few pints of the amber nectar took the doom and gloom away.
Nuno and Ole are talking of Jimenez leaving, Nuno refusing to deny Ole saying what a great player he is and he is linked to them. To be honest, I’m not going to be devastated if that happened, these stars need to challenge themselves all the time, if Jimmy wants to leave, I don’t want him to stay. I want 100% every game and if a player has his head elsewhere then off they can go.
Now, before you all throw your teddies out the pram, this is paper talk, these are my thoughts alone. I don’t want agents who play their stars against the management disrupting the other players. I want the fully fit side that picks itself Week in week out, with the subs on the bench busting a gut to get on the pitch and chomping at the bit to prove themselves.
I watched Benny Ashley Seal in the Caraboa cup against Villa, then again up at Salford a few weeks back and nothing convinces me about last nights performance that the lad is ready for the big stage. Nuno gave him his big chance and he wasted it big-time.
I was looking forward to some time off as much as the players, it’s been a long old season, but that’s scuppered too, although I’m really proud of Doc’s hands up approach, admitting that he headed the ball onto his arm before it went in, no pleading with the ref like a Man U player at every decision, so fair play to the guy. Off to Old Trafford for yet another game in this long old season of ours. But hey, it’s certainly been a great old ride.
Stu, in general I would agree that if a player has his head elsewhere then let him go,
The problem in this case is that Jimenz seems to be the only player on our team who currently finds the goal on a regular basis (without him we would be bottom half of the table at best) and arguably our best player.
Additionally, we are not an established top 4 team yet where other players of his (or better) calibre will want to come to us, so I see this as a dangerous, one-way policy at the moment. I think we need every good player we have to be committed to the cause of establishing Wolves as a top 6 team, and to be bound by contract to do so. Only then can we open the doors for incomings and outgoings.
If Jimenz leaves, Jota better find his scoring boots he seems to have lost over summer. And we’d better find a replacement better than the likes of Bonatini or Cutrone, who seem to be the best we have been able to find of late. (While on the subject 🙂 I’m not too impressed with the names being touted for coming in January either .. 2-3 goals in 20+ games isn’t exactly great for a center forward, ok! More Bonatinis. I don’t need boys who cry because they score a goal. Let’s have some men for a change. They’re supposed to be center forwards, for f’s sake, and they have one job only, to score … every freaking game. Not twice every twenty. Rant over :-))
Bigger question here is though: if Jimenz wants something bigger, why Man Utd? He can do better, surely! Even by staying at Wolves!
I ,like many others ,have complained that it was obvious from the start of the season that we needed a bigger squad but Nuno was adamant we did not .If he learns one thing from this season however it ends up it is that he cannot possibly hope to compete at the highest level to which we can now legitimately aspire with so few players however flexible and adaptable they are to different positions .He has been enormously naive on this score .
They can probably just about get away with the present compliment in defence with Boly not too far away but we desperately need a player who can score goals from midfield and a striker who has an instinctive eye for goal .We miss far far too many chances if we want to progress .
Neither of these are likely to be available in January at prices the club is willing to pay so I am predicting a good remainder of the season without quite achieving what we would like to achieve .
Naturally hope I am wrong but fear I am right .
We have heard some strange excuses from the opposition over the years – wind and wrong shape of ball etc but Ole gets my vote for the best one.
https://metro.co.uk/2020/01/05/ole-gunnar-solskjaer-manchester-united-wolves-12003550/?ito=newsnow-feed
I love the cash in the Christmas card reference! I’m hoping Nuno has received a gift card for Mendes & Mendes Associates to the tune of 100m. Just perfect for the January sales. After all we are a top 6 side, no?
If Nuno has said publicly at any point that he only wanted a small squad I have not heard it.
I am aware of rumours that he was not happy with the number and profile of players brought in last summer.
Key learning points from the Wesley, Jolinton, Moise Keane, Haller purchases are, that there ain’t a lot out of quality out there, you can spend a lot and still get ordinary. Just because we have snared some real diamonds doesn’t mean we know of a secret supply.
We can carry on bleating that we need a bigger squad, more players that can score 20 goals a season, a bigger ground and Wolverhampton to be a coastal resort with a tropical climate all we like, but it don’t make it happen.
It don’t make comments like “I said we needed a bigger squad” or “I said we needed more points than any other team if we want to win the league” insightful.
We are where we are and my major concern is what Nuno feels about all this. Maybe he doesn’t mind Raul going to Man Utd because he thinks he could be managing him next season.
If you were the owners of Man Citeh and Pep said he was leaving who would be the only name on your list to replace him.
I’m just concentrating on remembering where we came from and enjoying every day of the moment. João you are a stone cold bloody genius.
Nuno will not join any team in the top 5 or so of the Premier League. He will not play players who don’t play exactly like he wants them to and these teams probably have many stars who are like that.
So do you think Man City is going to bring him in and he is going to say that half the team don’t play his way and he wants to get rid of them and bring in players that do play his way? It would be a two year time where he is retooling a team at that level.
Nuno is not Rodgers. (I just realized that last night as I was walking home from the pub)
Haven’t we come a long way in a couple of years. The prospect of drawing Man U in the cup used to be terrifying but clearly that’s not the case. We seem agreed that they are not terrifying anymore and annoyed that we haven’t beaten them with an understrength team. Just remember that .
Also that newspapers make excellent lining for wheelie bins.
It would be nice to know where we stand in the financial stability stakes (or ffp as it was once known) but i dont suppose fosun are going to tell anybody that one.
Its alright talking about buying big and getting real talent in to bolster our move for the top four but that doesn’t take a few million quid it takes a few hundred million quid and the wages to go with it as well.
Are we up to that financial challenge?
Nuno will undoubtedly be frustrated because he is within grasp of that top echelon now and i dont think at the start of this season he thought he would be.
No one realised how much arsenal ,spurs ,man utd, Chelsea and even man city had fallen away.
I have a feeling we will not be signing world class established players for sixty or seventy million this january .
But its a fact we need to sign at least a couple of our type of players and not someone for the future or anyone thats going to take six months to bed in.
We need experience and we need it now.
Juan Mata would suit us and he doesn’t get much playing time at man utd any more.
But if not him we need players of his ilk. Players who may be a little older than you may like but have been there and done it.
Look at Joe moutinho absolute quality.
Those are the sort of players you need to shore up a creaking ship.
We are far from a shipwreck but the stormy seas are taking there toll on the small squad and only quality will stop us sinking.
Big fan of Mata. Another one to consider in the experienced age category at a reasonable price as a decent squad player is Camarassa. Looked decent at Cardiff and Palace don’t seem to want to play him.
“….We are far from a shipwreck but the stormy seas are taking there toll on the small squad and only quality will stop us sinking….”
Wow, how times have changed from just a week ago.
Jacomac & Spikeyboy.
Chuck my hat into the Mata corner too. I think the guy is a right baller and a great work horse.
Any of you out of towners not coming to the Espanyol game, there’s a blogger who’s looking for two tickets, for him and his newly converted grandson.
Stu might be able to help with at least one ticket
Let me know.
John
Thanks for that but it is two together required due to the grandson’s age.
Well meant though, thank you.
Keep in mind, they brought in a couple of youngsters who both got injured around the same time. And why Cutrone didn’t work out we’ll probably never know (Although I have my suspicions).
You can only bring in players who are willing to come here and who their team is willing to sell (OK, Rui is an exeption). We are also at a high enough level that those players will cost a lot and since Fosun tend to buy low and sell high, that will be tough.
Hi Tim,
Why do you think he is going – or can you not say? News is a bit limited in thew depths of Norfolk!
Tim Nash has reported that Cutrone is in Italy now, even before any deal has been signed. Not a good sign.
Two and a half years ago.
Nuno Espirito who?
We will be in the Prem, and take four points off Chelsea, United, and Arsenal, and knock Liverpool and United out of the FA Cup?
In less than three years we will beat Manchester City, the reigning champions, three times in half a season?
Fifth in the Prem around Christmas, and in the last 32 of the second biggest Cup competition in Europe?
Son, your afternoon out from the nuthouse is over, you have to go back to your padded cell, you have become totally delusional. You are a Wolves fan, not a top six fan.
This Fosun lot have no clue, we’ve just had Zenga, Lambert and a dice with relegation, they don’t know what they’re doing, they’ll be back off to China by season’s end.
Fast forward two and a half years.
Just played 4 games in eight days, three of them against “top six” clubs.
Of course the guys are knackered and punch drunk.
Shit, even a close friend of mine who goes to every game admitted he was footballed out, and wasn’t sure which town he was in!
And our players are being criticized and the manager questioned, after one, no two, below par performances.
Four years ago we would have given our first born children to be playing against the likes of United, City and Liverpool, even Watford, in the Prem.
Can we stop and think back to what it was like under morgan and greasel, the depths to which we had sunk, the crumb snatching from the big boy’s table for scraps of cast off players?
We STILL supported the team unreservedly, and fanatically, if fatalistically.
We never gave up on them.
Every club has a bad patch, let’s hope we’ve just seen ours.
Can we please get off their backs.
Fosun, Jeff and Nuno know what they are doing. We need to ignore all the bullshit in the media.
As we all know, bullshit sells papers, and the more successful a club, the more bullshit abounds.
We will be in the draw for the fourth round, unlike Villa.
United were time wasting at the end of the game yesterday, they won’t relish a hungry pack at OT.
We need to fill the house on Saturday, scare the snot out of Brucies lot, and back our guys to the hilt.
And, of course, I will be there!
See y’all next week, hopefully.
Come on Charlton.
FOwb
Maybe if they don’t want the team to take 20 minutes to get going every game, they shouldn’t have them dicking around for 20 minutes at the beginning of every practice.
Try a week where they have scrimmages after a 5 minute warm-up and see if that gets them going faster during a game.
There must be some reason for why they consistently take such a long time to get going.
I think that’s all for injury reduction Tim. The stats suggest it may actually work.
I absolutely agree with Clive. This is not the time to doubt.
Given the financial investment that Fosun have made thus far –exactly as they promised to do — is it really likely that they will now allow their plan to be derailed overnight ? Similarly are we to believe that Nuno, a master tactician in every sense, has no plan in place to ensure that progress is maintained towards his long term goal ? I think not.
The main concern that I have is the immediate lack of cover for Jiminez. Ignoring the rumors of his impending sale, should he be injured just who is available to replace him ? Cutrone appears to be on his way out — and in any event has been hugely disappointing. If Ashley Seal is our next best option, then his display yesterday clearly tells us we have a big problem The guy is nowhere near ready to step up. This issue surely has to be addressed somehow during the January window
How has Cutrone been disappointing?
Positives: he runs about a lot: he seems to have considerable commitent: he promises much.
Negatives: He delivers nothing: there are no end results: when he has come on as a sub, he has never made a positive difference: he is not a natural goal scorer — in fact scoring seems to be such a rarity that on the very rare occasion he manages it, he needs to have a good cry by way of celebration.
Summary: Nice genuine bloke: not good enough for this team: We now need far more than effort and comittment.
He was scoring in the Premier League at a rate of 23 goals per season. Does that indicate no end product?
Is it true that Jamie Carragher gave the MoTM award to Trent Alexander-Arnold?
OODCL
Only after it was referred to VAR.
A couple of friends and I came up from Devon for the game. It’s a long trip and a long way back and by the time we got home our tanks were pretty empty. Which in it’s way, is kinda like how our team has looked in the last couple of games. We looked drained for large parts of the game, lacking the sparkle and zip which has become synonymous with our team thus far. And no wonder, having played a ludicrous number of matches in the last couple of weeks. Such fixture congestion demeans the competitions as no team can give of their best when both physically and mentally knackered. I only hope that the slightly longer break before the Geordies come to town will help to revive our weary troops.
Anyway, the upshot is that we now have yet another fixture to fulfill which neither team needed or wanted. Any new arrivals will need to be blooded pretty quickly if this seasons spectacular progress is to maintained over the second half of the season.
But what no one accounted for in a replay is the Clive Factor!!
Dog willing I will be there and screaming my heart out and my head off at and with my old gold and black footballing hero’s and fellow bloggers and fanatics!!
Eat yer prawn ridden hearts out, you Old Trafford posers, Clive is on his way.
Dougie Singh has offered me free pitching in his back garden of a borrowed Brompto tent, ( the front of his new house is paved for my rental car to park) Doogle and Sue have offered me free food and drink for a week, and Lord of The Twix has promised me
as many choccy bars as I can stuff in my squirrel like cheeks.
I only have to waddle out of Old Trafford after the game, and I get on my morning flight back to the land of the free.
Perfecto timing.
See y’all in a few days.
Wouldn’t 5-1 against the Geordies be just dandy Clive?
Tickets for FA Cup replay on sale from 2pm today.
Actual date to be announced in next 24 hours, 14th or 15th Jan.
I think we missed a trick here we could have played a full strength side against Utds much changed team and won we would have had a full week off to recover and avoided a replay……..!
This is what happens when you don’t take the competition seriously.
Here’s a weird thought.
What do y’all think about taking Giroud for a few months, playing up front alongside Jimmy?
Someone needs to get on the end of Adama’s crosses more frequently.
Just askin’
i would go with that but i think he is on daft London wages .
If that was sorted he would love those adama crosses.
And now for something completely different….
A confession guys – I have kept a secret for years – I used to have an obsession with …..
football floodlight pylons! There got it out at last.
Today virtually every stadium has the lights in the roof of the stand – how uniform and how boring. Most of them appear to be doppelgangers of each other whereas when I first started watching Wolves around 60 years ago I used to watch in awe as the lights beamed down at Molineux. During evening matches great clouds of smoke used to drift up into the beams from countless coffin nails such as Woodbines or Park Drive or Players Number 6 cigarettes. A virtual fog!
Coincidentally on the train back to Euston on Saturday we had a discussion on all things football with 5 London Mancs. One of them said “I think Wolves were the first club to have floodlights”. “Well not quite” I replied “some floodlit football had been evident before the 1950’s but Swindon Town were actually the first club to install them permanently. However Wolves under the shrewd management of (Sir) Stan Cullis realised the massive potential and erected the first set of Molineux pylons in 1953 and in September of that year played an experimental game v South Africa. The rest as they say is history”. (Wolves replaced those initial pylons in 1957 with much taller structures. I think that first set were installed either at Worcester City or Wellington Town – later Telford United).
Then I started going to away matches normally by coach or train – dad could not afford a car in those days – and it was with growing excitement I peered out of the window to try and spot the pylons as we neared our far away destination.
It was impossible to miss those at Elland Road – the tallest in the football league at a whopping 240 feet actually dwarfing Nelson’s Column.
I remember visiting Boothferry Park in January 1969 for a third round FA cup tie which Wolves won 3-1 (Doog 2 and Frank Wignall) in front of a capacity 27,500 attendance. Two things got me – a train station where you alighted onto the platform and then entered through the turnstiles plus 6 floodlight pylons. The only football stadium with 6 pylons – one in each corner and two opposite each other across the halfway line.
On my first visit to Anfield in November 1969 (Wolves drew 0-0, Paul Walker was so unlucky when his shot stuck in thick mud on the goal line only to be booted clear by Chris Lawler. Fatty goalkeeper Tommy Lawrence was stranded) what amazed me was how small the pylons were – in fact tiny compared to Molineux.
And finally the lights at St James’s Park, Newcastle dwarfed the surrounding areas – a bit like Elland Road. The design was more what you get in Scotland. On my first visit in August 1970 when Don Everall coached were wrecked by a hail of bricks, I gazed up at these enormous pylons seemingly reaching up into the clouds.
Each club’s pylons had their own distinctive design and shape and one could virtually name most grounds by the floodlight design.
I will post a few images from pylons of the past.
However times change…..sometimes not for the best as regards to football floodlight pylons!!
BOG
I hope you are getting professional help for your issues 🙂
BOG
Floodlights were installed at Bilston Town FC, Queen St. in 1953 and were first used for a friendly match against Wolverhampton Wanderers on 10 March 1953. As a result of the success of that event, Wolves then installed floodlights and became one of the first club sides in Britain to invest in floodlighting, in 1953 and at a cost of £10,000.
Check Wikipedia.
So Bilston was there first and shrewd Stan Cullis picked up on the concept
Thanks BOG very interesting summary of another aspect of football history and one particularly associated with our club. I have always loved the atmosphere at floodlit matches and although I was too young to experience the Honved era my dad described them in great detail. I always felt the ghosts of Hancocks and Wright were still in the atmosphere for night games.
As a kid (and adult) travelling through towns you knew had a football team meant i was always scanning the horizon for their floodlights. If it was evening time and the lights were on i would be wondering who they were playing and wishing i was at the game.
I suppose floodlights have joined in the trends set by new football grounds and shopping centres, all the same design, faceless indistinct lacking in character and tradition. One of the many reasons why we have to stay at the Mol.
A most enlightening post BOG.
Elland Road floodlight pylons 1960’s…….
To finish the Anfield Floodlights circa 1969…..
Stop it, I’m getting a “chubby” here!!
How come we only got a measley 3000 tickets for the replay?
How many did they get at the Mol?
I thought a certain percentage of the stadium capacity had to be made available to the opposition.
Bastards don’t deserve to progress, and they won’t!
Agree completely, Clive. They got circa 4 500. 15% is supposedly the rule unless there are segregation problems and the Local Safety Advisory Group doesn’t raise objections. That would mean about 11,000. Apparently the SAG has the final say. Hopefully Wolves will remember this whenever we next play them at home in the cup.
The reason is as plain as the face behind your nose Clive.
I have just come off e-bay, where Iv’e managed to sell my kidney, for some reason the bloke buying it wouldn’t take both?
I however also managed to sell my spleen to a very nice Chinese guy who will grind it to a powder and sell it as an aphrodisiac.
This has enabled me to afford to buy a ticket for the game.
Adult tickets have been priced between £47 – £55.
The reason we only got 3000 is that’s all we probably asked for, hundreds if not more have said, ” they will not pay those prices”. Wolves would have to pay for unsold tickets so they are being cautious.
Anyone wanting a ticket who is a STH, should get one this time.
Greedy, greedy Man U in this instance, absolute disgrace, we capped their prices at £35, we gave them 4500 and they will probably play a second string team again too.
Man U site posted tickets for sale for Wolves replay as Tuesday 14th Jan 19:45.
Not sure that your reasoning is right for the ticket allocation, Stu. Man City only got 3 000 for the Caribou cup semi final.
My guess would be, perhaps something to do with the police, local derby, trouble…
Just saying.
And the Wolves app posting replay date as Tuesday now.
So we beat the greedy mancs and have to play that bloody lot again.
Don’t know about you but I am sick to the back teeth of sodding Watford!
They haven’t got through, yet.
Yep this result was due to a thin squad and therefor we need 4 new key players but I feel as a lot of us do that Neves could finance that and Mendes is lining up potential new players that he can eventually profit on them too..He is the best in the business ..
I’m confused as to how much we are allowed to spend under the guidelines without having to sell players who are not up to our getting higher standard..
(Neves excluded)
I fancy us at OldTrafford if Jiménez and Traoré plays ..
Just a thought, Fosun defined our early success and can define our future success, they don’t have to sell anybody, if they still believe in their goal they could easily invest in more high quality players and retain the existing ones, some signs (unless I’m hopefully proved wrong) that their ambition is wavering slightly UTW
A little bit sad to see Ivan Cav signed permanently by Fulham.
I know a few bloggers would agree with me that he still had quite a lot to offer to Wolves.
With our small squad, even if he didn’t start, he would have made a pretty impressive impact sub.
I wish him all the best.
Man Utd game changed to Wednesday for BT sport. Dohhhhhh
No
They changed it coz they knew I was gonna be there on the Tuesday.
Yellow bellied shitbags.
Their loss, I would have vastly increased their bar sales!!
Well, they will be out of two cup competitions in two weeks, and the Europa Cup when we play ‘em!
Maybe I’m being naive. But, Tabith Chong is available on a free transfer. Strikes me as a good fit for our team.
Wouldn’t be available until summer.
Am I showing my Yankee “ignorant about football” roots?
As previously stated I think this transfer window and even more so, the upcoming summer window, will be defining moments in the Fosun ownership. Many fans suspected at the time that our business last summer was underwhelming and so it has subsequently been proved with Vallejo and Cutrone being released so quickly. I think we are entering a new phase. With investment in established quality ( a la acquisition of moutinho, Patricio) plus retention of our top talent ( eg Jimenez, traore etc), we will know that the originally stated Fosun ambition for us to become one of the best teams in the world remains undimmed. The alternative scenario where we exclusively sign young potential that sit in the u23s/ peripherary of the first team and/ or recycle our top talent to bolster the squad numbers will indicate to me that Fosun’s initial ambition has been somewhat compromised. This is not intended to be a criticism as fosun have been fantastic for our club, however, I think the latter scenario will heavily influence how long Nuno will stay committed to the wolves project, which is also pivotal, as I think he is the best wolves manager since Cullis.
Totally agree, Fosun have and are doing wonders for us, it’s just interesting to see which way they will go in the next two windows, the amazing thing is that the team they and Nuno have created must be worth an absolute fortune, they have been very clever, I wonder what value the first 11 is,? Any thoughts, just retaining all of them is important, or maybe they will sell one for a huge price and reinvest the full fee received, anyway time will tell UTW
My guess is that the first xi, is worth c £200-300m in terms of transfer value. But of course that is only an opinion based on gut feel rather than any sophisticated valuation techniques ? . It would be interesting to know what others think.