Goal Glut Made Wolves Champions Again

There was no swimming in the ocean, no brushes with pop star ‘royalty’ and no epic extra-time golden goal winner when Wolves returned to the land of their famous 1967 conquest. Two years on from lapping it up on Los Angeles’ fashionable Wilshire Boulevard, meeting The Monkees and finally overcoming Aberdeen in a final that is still regularly talked about on both sides of Hadrian’s Wall, they had to make do with somewhat less plush and desirable surrounds.

A Prize Catch – And No Passport Required

Not once but twice in the Graham Turner years, Wolves travelled to the holiday island off the north-west coast of Wales to prepare for Second Division campaigns – their first two back up, in fact, following their 1980s slide to the Football League basement. Because of a combination of their own impoverished state and the fact they were hardly seen as a big draw, overseas trips were off the agenda for much of that decade, so much so that even a few days around the British coastline when they came along.

England Trip With A Molineux Flavour

England’s B team tour under Bobby Robson at the end of 1977-78 wasn’t only one of the longest and furthest-reaching of football trips undertaken from these shores. It was also one containing a heavy Wolves presence. But the inclusion of John Richards, Steve Daley and Mel Eves for an arduous series of games and flights around the Far East and New Zealand was only part of it.

Jones At Home On Iberian Adventure

Wolves’ trips to Portugal down the decades have tended to come in batches. Three times in the first half of the 1970s, Bill McGarry’s side went there to play ties in the UEFA Cup. Then, Dave Jones used Spain’s long, narrow neighbour for pre-season tours in two successive years in the early ‘noughties.’

Testing Times For Weary Travellers

Snow Escape Leads To Sky Blues Double Header

It was less a tour and more two short hops but rarely have Wolverhampton Wanderers been more relieved to board a plane and find some match practice. With Britain shivering in the grip of one of its bitterest winters of the 20th century, the vision of Stan Cullis came to the fore once more as he took his squad off on their travels in the second half of 1962-63.

A Very English Affair
The pre-season of 1995/96 saw Wolves eschew the glamour (and presumably expense) of an overseas trip as they embarked on one of the most low-profile preparations the club had undertaken in the modern era. As a marked change from the norm in that decade, Graham Taylor chose nothing more exotic than a visit to two non-League clubs in the Home Counties of Buckinghamshire and Kent.

Air Miles And Victories In Abundance

Life In The Fast Lane

Wolves’ pre-Premier tour to Western Australia in July is sure to evoke memories of the pioneering globe-trotting adventures the club have undertaken in years gone by. But it comes nowhere near the mammoth trip to North America on which they embarked after their promotion-winning season of 1966-67.