Plenty of people might have suspected it was written in the stars that Keane would get a goal today, but I suspect few foresaw what a pivotal part he was to play.  I’ve not been bothered for years about seeing him back at Molineux, but this was certainly the worst-case scenario for any Wolves fan his second coming.

The first significant action of the game happened when Berra dithered over a Jarvis backpass into the penalty box, allowed Bent to dispossess him, and then clumsily felled the attacker on the road to nowhere in the back corner of the penalty box.  A completely indisputable penalty and a completely unnecessary one.

Bent slotted away a poor penalty and Villa were ahead.  As seems to be the way with this Wolves team, going behind stirred them to show that they could attack, and as they proved on this occasion, in spectacular fashion too.  First on 21 minutes, Frimpong skillfully set up Kightly who produced a perfect shot from the edge of the penalty area to beat several players and the keeper and to level the game.  Kightly and Frimpong in particular continued to delight, with Jarvis also proving a headache for his opponents as we have so regularly seen.

It was unfortunate that the ever-energetic Edwards didn’t show the same composure and we had seen moments before, hitting a great opportunity unmarked from the centre of the penalty box tamely straight at Given.  Moments later he was able to atone by flicking Johnson’s header past the keeper from a few yards out.  Wolves continued to dominate, with the bad guys surviving another goalmouth scramble to go in at half time only one goal behind.

It was inevitable in the second half that Villa would improve: They’re not a bad team I hear, but actually they didn’t look up to much at Molineux.  Neither, unfortunately did Wolves after such a promising first half.  It could be argued that bringing on Warnock after the break stifled Kightly, but realistically he already looked tired, but was mainly isolated by Wolves’s insistence that attacking via Jarvis on the left was suddenly the only way forward.  While he was still often able to beat the pair of Villa players who were able to concentrate their energies on him, the tactic was predictable, and the quality of crosses in the circumstances inevitably variable.

Four things conspired to break this dull deadlock.  First Keane produced a brilliant quickfire strike from outside the penalty area.  Hennessey may well think he could have done better, and it was worrying to see the otherwise excellent Welshman beaten again from long-range, but there’s no disputing the quality of the strike.  Then Henry, slightly backheeled Albrighton who had been hanging onto his other leg resolutely for a few seconds while the referee watched on.  A completely indisputable sending off and a completely unnecessary one, although never a dangerous move, just a silly, frustrated one.   Granted it was frustrating that a foul should already have been called, and granted Albrighton made an embarrassing meal of the incident, but it was the worst way for Henry to end an otherwise excellent game for him.  Albrighton is the only Villa player I would have taken into our team based on their showing yesterday, but were he a Wolves player I hope I would still have had the sense to be ashamed of his behavior.

Then Frimpong, such a key driving force until then, was carried off with an eye injury after an unfortunate collision with Petrov’s boot.  I wish him a very swift recovery – apart from anything else, it looks like we’re really going to need him.

Then from long range again Robbie Keane produced surely the best strike we’ll see from him in the remainder of his career, and the rest is history. With 10 man Wolves had a frantic last eight minutes, but it was too little, too late.

So there we have it, in 90 minutes, Villa mustered an undisputed, but completely Wolves self-inflicted penalty and two brilliant goals.  This would not have happened on another day and we would have won the game.  This loss was not down to ill-luck, as McCarthy implied in his otherwise spot on post-match interview, but to both genius (of the type I’m prepared to bet we won’t see from Keane again) and of stupidity from Henry and, particularly Berra (of the type I’m prepared to hope we will not see again) and therefore, while trying not to read too much into a good 35 minutes of play, can be considered a freak result.

Devastating as the second half was to witness, the selection was right, Kightly and Frimpong both showed themselves to be game-changing additions to the starting line up, and I’m sticking with the whole team, management and all, to turn around this sinking ship.  Just.

Out of politeness, of course, I took the opportunity to ask some searching questions of them in return, which went something along the lines of: “So, I assume you’re reasonably happy with how things are going…What’s your predicted line up and score?”

Hart

Richards
Kompany
Lescott
Clichy

Barry
Yaya Toure

Silva
Aguero
Milner

Balotelli

and I think it’ll finish 3-0 to us.

My own humble contribution is as follows, but I really struggled to forsee what team the usually eminently predictable Mick might pick.  Am I kidding myself that yesterday might have changed anything?

1. Who are Wolves’ key players?

Stephen Ward, who in most people’s mind has always been a makeshift left back, has been a revelation this season.  He’s not had much in the way of a competition from the rest of the team, but has been the one consistent player this season.  Unspectacular but excellent.

Jamie O’Hara has got a lot of stick recently – often justifiably as he’s been very careless – but he’s got enthusiasm to burn and, if he gets a chance to play further forward than he has often this season, will be instrumental.

New arrival Roger Johnson will, I suspect, be key one way or the other. Judging by recent form it will be by bungling to let in a goal or two, but we’ll need him to be up to his best to keep the defence tight.

We’ve got a few patchy geniuses in the squad.  Milijas, Guedioura and Hammill all have it in them to change games, but Milijas puts in nearly as many anonymous as commanding performances, and the other two are still pretty hit and miss – always wanting the ball, but either great or completely
overreaching themselves.

2. Were you happy with the business conducted during the transfer window?

I wouldn’t say happy, but I think it’s sensible.  Lacking either the recklessness of other teams or the flowing oil money of others (mentioning no names; brushing chip off shoulder) the amount we spend is always going to be relatively modest.  With that in mind, I would still have liked to see at least another quality centre back, but thought we got did well to get Roger Johnson and Jamie O’Hara.  I am getting less happy as the weeks pass though. Johnson and O’Hara both looked excellent buys but neither has played to their potential so far this season.

3. What are your expectations for this season?

Finishing 16th, with a lot of pain and bickering on the way.

4. Are you happy with the manager?

Yes.  We’re on a very poor run, and going 2-nil down at home against Swansea was a touch trying at the time but he’s the most successful manager the club has had for more than 30 years.  I like him and think he cares as much about winning as anyone, although I do wish he’d shut up moaning about the fans booing him.  Not that he’s wrong, just that it’ll only make things worse. It’ll stop soon enough if we win a few games.

5. Are there any rising stars in the squad that we might not have heard of?

Wolves used to excel at bringing young talent through the academy, but haven’t had done well of late, with Mark Davies at Bolton and Joleon Lescott being the most notable ‘recent’ products  We do have a better recent record of improving ‘bargain basement’ players, with the core of the squad – for
better or worse – still composed of the team that won the Championship a few years back.  Matt Doherty is the only youngster to make it into the first team of late, and judging by his two appearances this season, could go far. At junior level and now in the reserves, Zele Ismail has been making gentle waves for some time, but he’s a secret and if I told you I’d have to kill
you.

6. If you could have any City player in your team who would you choose?

There’s quite a choice and we probably wouldn’t be turning any of them down, provided they’re willing to take a little pay cut for the glory of playing for Wolverhampton.  I should say David Silva on recent reports but, for sentimental reasons – and because I think our comedy defending of late is
the main reason for the ongoing lack of confidence amoung the team – I have to say Lescott.

7. What is your perception of City as a club?

Obviously a quality bunch of players, and finally looking like gelling as a team, but overriding perception would have to be summarised as “upstart oiks ruining the league (further) for the rest of us with lots of money and being very good”

8. Likely Wolves starting XI for Saturday, and score prediction?

Predicting the score is a scary prospect at the moment.  Wednesday was one of the best Wolves performances of the year so however much I want to say we’ll surprise everyone, I think I’d be going out on a limb.

Predicting the Wolves line up is usually very easy: Fans – me among them – will bay for some combination of Milijas, Hammil or Guedioura to start and for a change in defence, but Mick will stick with the same team as last week.  This time I think a few players made a good case for a place in the starting line up and we might even see a little bit of a reshuffle. I’ll go (with no confidence this is what we’ll actually see, although surely we won’t play two up front):

Hennessey

Stearman – Johnson – Berra – Ward

Henry – Milijas

Hunt – O’Hara – Jarvis

Doyle

and wouldn’t be surprised to see Guedioura and Hammil make an appearance.

Hell, I’ll say it anyway – we’ll surprise everyone…

and only lose 2-1.  But I always hope for better.

Come on Wolves!

Many fans are baying for McCarthy’s head and performances have been worse than most last season, with the notable exception of some decent spells against Liverpool, Spurs and Newcastle, against whom we deserved at least a point, and would have got it were it not for the sterling work of Mike Halsey and his boss-eyed assistants.

Perhaps it’s my own streak of that McCarthy stubbornness that makes me say this, but Mick deserves longer to prove people wrong.

That his record at this club – in the Championship and the top flight is better than any Wolves manager of the last 30 years speaks for itself.  We are in our third Premier League season, and not the only team to find it doesn’t get any easier. McCarthy has built a sound Premier League team with relatively modest resources (still primarily from the best of a Championship winning team, but I’ve no problem with that).  Of late there seems to be some frustration in the ranks, but there’s still no doubting McCarthy’s ability to get the best from good hard-working players (I’ll save the debate about whether he can get the same from less hard-working but more creative players, as that’s not what we have).  His players are underperforming in whatever tactical formation they play.  This will change.  Johnson has clearly yet to settle, and there’s no reason to believe that the rest of the team are suddenly worse players than they have been in recent years.  I wanted Hammil to play on Sunday – he did and he was as average as the rest of the team, Ward excepted again – but that’s no reason to think he or the rest of the team are no longer good enough.  Seven points from eight games sees us in 16th position.  Had those points been spread more evenly over the eight games, I’d be feeling dissatisfied but not panicked.

With good early results against poor opposition we did flatter to deceive; results since against average-going-on-good opposition have been poor.  Of course this has to end – and soon.  The below results, give or take a couple of points, are both achieveable and important, and would see us in solid mid-table form.  Nothing more can be expected, slightly less is more realistic.  Early results might have raised expectations that signing two decent players over the summer might have somehow turned us into something more, but the club continues its course of steady and safe investment, which will prove to be the best course as more teams implode in a futile attempt to stay near the biggest spenders.

My wishlist:

Swansea 3pts
Man City 0pts
Wigan 3pts
Everton 1pt
Chelsea 0pt
Sunderland 1pt

Fail to achieve that – fail to address last season’s pattern of being very nearly good enough – and I might just change my mind, but right now, there is no reason to do that.

From my position on the goalline, it was clear the linesman was an idiot

Halsey was the only one in the entire stadium who thought Taylor’s foul on O’Hara a yard inside the box deserved a free kick not a penalty. To pretend the foul could have been outside was spineless. Then to disallow Doyle’s last gasp equaliser because the ball had apparently already gone out of play was ridiculous. I’ll put this one down to the *probably* (unproven – he may just have been stupid and lazy) linesman.

Let’s be clear before I say any more: Wolves deserved a point – or more – from this game , and would have got it but for the incompetence of the match officials. Let’s hope not to see them near our team until they’ve learned the basics.

However, while I’m happy to give Newcastle some credit (kind of me, I think), especially Gutierrez for the second – that we found ourselves 2-0 down was very much our own fault. Johnson lost his marker for the first; for the second O’Hara, and then – critically – Henry, mispassed the ball in midfield to the opposition. Gutierrez, picked it up with plenty to do, but easily passed Johnson and scored a good goal.

So, lazy passing and poor defending cost us as much as poor refereeing. Our attack – in patches, and especially after substitutions – was better than in last few games, but not yet good enough. From 25 shots, 12 on target, we managed 2 goals (I choose to allow the second). Again, credit to Newcastle for this, with keeper Krul pulling off some excellent saves, but a couple of times he should have been given no chance.

So, finally onto team selection, certainly second the most contentious issue around the ground (after refereeing, of course). One change from the Liverpool lineup saw Fletcher in for Edwards, and although they started brightly the team soon lapsed into apathy, losing key battles and making silly mistakes in midfield. This was no excuse for Henry to be jeered off the pitch (for my money he’d mainly put in a decent defensive display and, the even more careless O’Hara should have gone), but there’s no doubting that the injection of Guedioura and Hammil brought some much needed energy and creativity to the attack. They’re not perfect and misplaced a couple of crosses – no more than, say, Jarvis had, though – but neither were afraid of trying something different and running at the defence, and even stirred O’Hara into showing some of the attacking flair he seems to have been hiding too much this season.

The referee and the Toon keeper may have kept the points from us, but our attacking edge needs some sharpening. Guedioura for O’Hara, and Hammil for Hunt next game please.

In my dreams…

It’s not often a loss can be the subject of such celebrations as we saw today but, believe me, us Wolfies will be partying into the night, and probably a fair way into next week too.

Let's get the party started

So many times it could have gone the another way.  Wolves have never been a team to do it the easy way, but going three nil down was a hammer blow.  Blackburn came out the blocks fighting, and Wolves looked in danger of going down more brawling with fighting, with Henry sailing particularly close to the wind.   Defensive frailties that have plagued us throughout the season came back at the worst possible time.

Even with a torrid first half though, we looked likely to be helped out by the teams around us until Blackpool took a plucky lead (it’s ok to patronise them now they’re in the Championship again) away at Man U.  As Wolves recovered in the second half, with the introduction of Ebanks Blake and a more confident approach almost having an immediate effect, the numerous permutations played themselves out in front of our eyes when Man U went ahead, Birmingham went behind, but then Wigan took the lead.  Then when Birmingham equalised, we were suddenly on the way down on goal difference.  We should take satisfaction that Hunt’s goal to take the game to 2-3 meant that in the end we probably had done enough to save ourselves without Tottenham’s injury time winner against Birmingham.

We may not have done it in style, but we did enough, and so it’s goodbye to West Ham, Blackpool and Birmingham.

When the partying stops, of course, they’ll be plenty to think about.  Despite some brilliant spells, Wolves made heavy work of their survival – I hope – will have to take a long, hard look at their defensive options next year.  We were recently flagged up as one of only four teams in the league to make a profit in the last financial results and, discounting Arsenal’s boost from property sales at Highbury, the only one with any significant profit – £9m in the first Premier season.  The gamble paid off, but in the greed league there’s a fine line to walk.

But that’s for the future.  For the Wolves fans for now, there’s just the party.  Congratulations to McCarthy, Morgan and Moxey and to the whole team for a remarkable end to a remarkable season.

Today could have been just the jump start we needed to launch an undeserved (on recent form) escape from relegation.  Wolves were gifted the early goal with an undeniable – and completely unnecessary – penalty conceded by Ben Foster for a foul on Ward, who was going nowhere.  Six minutes in, Fletcher slotted home confidently and Wolves had the lead.  It could have been our day for once.

Player advantage: 1. Shots on target: 1

A further gift came in the form of the sending off of Craig Gardner for a second yellow.  The Birmingham fans will have been unhappy with the referee giving a second yellow for a dive, but should perhaps spare their ire for the player who sought to get an advantage by cheating, even when the advantage to be gained was not that great.

Unfortunately by this point Wolves had already surrendered the lead in an all too familiar bout of shocking defending – this time with Mancienne the guilty party (a change at least from Berra or Stearman, I suppose) and Hennessey weak in trying to atone for the midfielder’s shocking header into the path of Larsson.

It can be notoriously hard to break down 10 men (and Wolves certainly find it so – when did we last beat 10 men? Ok, Blackpool, but other than that I can only remember the failures: Man U, Gillingham off the top of my head, but they’ll be many more I forget) but we failed to create any real chance of note despite the advantage.  The replacement of Jarvis by Hunt killed what attacking threat we had carried, and a 1-1 draw was a fair result.  O’Hara continued to raise expecations only to frustrate them; Henry gave the referee every chance to level the playing field by sending him off; Hammill looked, when he first came on for the second half, a candidate to give us real attacking threat, but too soon joined in the tactic of long balls into the box.  Ultimately, there was a lot of running, too little passing, and almost no spark.

Can we stay up?  Absolutely.  By definition, the teams at the bottom of the table tend to lose games – we’re bad but not alone.  Despite picking up only two points from the last five games, we’re only one point from safety, with three games to play.

Will we stay up?  The squad’s not changing and we’re unlikely to get anyone back from injury now, so if the players we have available now can’t play better as a team (and there’s been no sign in the last month that they can), we’ll need a very healthy dose of luck to get the results we need.  We were gifted plenty of luck today, and completely failed to capitalise, so let’s hope Santa’s willing to give us a second chance.  I find it hard to be hopeful but, while there’s everything to fight for, I’ll keep believing!

Next up West Brom, and I’m sure we’ll have no problem beating them, but we have to play for a win, and we have to believe we can achieve it.  Belief is a difficult commodity for teams in our position to come by.  Mick McCarthy has a week to instill it in his team.

Luckily, however, the team should be slightly quicker to pick themselves up from this particular fiasco than me, for whom it’s just one demonstration too many that we aren’t looking likely to learn from our mistakes soon enough this season.

Matt Jarvis told Absolute Radio (full interview to be aired this afternoon):

Obviously we were disappointed after the game, to concede so late on, but it’s been good in the camp this week. We’ve had a good few days training, and then had a nice day off to relax, and come back in today full of good spirits and ready for the game.

Matty also talks about the persisting rumours that he’s been close to an England call up, revealing he hasn’t spoken to Capello but:

it’s everyone’s dream, to play for their country, and that’s exactly what I want to do, but I just want to keep playing well for Wolves and see what happens.

Jarvis reveals that they hope to get three points from every game this season, which sounds a good idea to me, and that the new Rhianna has been on heavy rotation in the dressing room, which sounds like a terrible idea to me.

So, on with the show.  Wolves need three points from this game.  We seem to have delighted in being inconsistent this season so I think that, after last week’s mess up and, having perhaps finally convinced a lot of people that we DON’T have what it takes to beat teams like Blackpool, I think we’ll pull a win out the bag here.

The only likely change I think we’ll see is Foley for Hammill, giving the team a slightly more attacking mindset that last week.  Blackpool will attack well, and I’d expect to see us meeting their attack with more of our own, and hopefully avoid a repeat of last week’s stupidity of sitting and waiting for them to score in the second half.

Hennessey has been much maligned after a couple of errors last week, including a culpable role in W*** B***’s goal, but I’ve been much impressed with him since his return to the team.  I think he’s likely to be need a bit today, Blackpool being a sound attacking team, but that he’s up to the challenge.  So:

Hennessey

Zubar – Stearman – Berra – Elokobi

Hammil – Milijas – O’Hara – Henry – Jarvis

Doyle

Predictions anyone?

Interview credit: Absolute Radio’s Rock ‘N’ Roll Football show travels to Molineux for Wolves v Blackpool today. You can tune in on Absolute Radio extra – on DAB Digital Radio, 1215AM and online in the UK from 1.30pm as programming kicks off with Russ Williams for pre-match build up, followed by full live commentary from Jim Proudfoot, while Ian Wright takes care of post match analysis featuring player and manager interviews, fan phone ins and a healthy supply of banter. Tune in for the full Matt Jarvis interview from 1.30pm. For more go to www.absoluteradio.co.uk/football

I couldn’t manage to find any sympathy for the disappointed Manyoo fans, especially after a shameful attempt by Scholes to score with the most blatant handball since Maradonna. I can’t even imagine what it would be like to go to game after game and never see a loss. I suspect it breeds a rarely-thwarted expectation – all the sweeter, then for us as the bottom-placed team to end that run. Everyone need a dose of reality in the end.   Shades of 2004, anyone?

This, however, was even better than when Kenny Miller’s counter-attacking goal was clung to by a Wolves team staunch in defence. This was a deserved victory in which we not only finally denied United their sucker-punch last-minute goal, but we effectively stiffled most of their opportunity to attack in the second half. Last ditch defending was not required – good defending took its place across the pitch (because we won, I can overlook the aberration which was George Elokobi completely losing Nani for United’s goal).

The whole team earned the right to celebrate

Special mention must go to Jamie O’Hara for a most promising debut, to George Elokobi for a good game (see above) and a great goal, and to Kevin Doyle for his usual skillful running. I might have been tempted to award the second goal to Elokobi also (strangely, no one has even asked me to adjudicate on a official basis on these matters, however), but Doyle thoroughly deserves it for his tireless work through out the season. A mention also to Milijas for an excellent and commanding return to the starting 11.  Ok, and to the whole team, who collectively barely put a foot wrong. And finally, fully justified praise to Mick McCarthy for choosing the right team for the job – it’s always great to see him celebrate because there’s no doubting the team means as much to him as it does to us, in victory and as in defeat.

And I reserve the final praise for Ronald Zubar, whose game was epitomised by an excellent run the length of the pitch, which culminated in the free kick which won us the match. I was too grumpy after the Bolton debacle to review the match – if I had, however, it would probably have been to say how much Ronald Zubar was beginning to bring to mind that most committed of Molineux men – Lee Naylor. Today did nothing to make me think again about that comparison, but I’m happier to speak it out load today as it was for all the best reasons that the ghost of Naylor walked at Molineux again.

Because some claims require documentary evidence

Lee Naylor has his detractors (oh, so many of them!) and they had their reasons: His defending was error prone at key moments. The Zubar back pass at Bolton sharply recalled Naylor’s lapse in the last minute which cost us a 2004 victory at the Reebok. However, I can now, through the safety of several years distance, admit to being a fully paid up member of the Lee Naylor fan club – well, I did have ‘Naylor 3′ on the back of my replica shirt (and much pain that brought me, as you can imagine). For all his occasional defensive lapses, Naylor was an excellent, hard working attacking left back, always better going forward than defending, but Wolves to the core. Zubar has proved himself to be the same this week and, were I not past the age at which it is acceptable, I’d have ‘Zubar 23′ on the back of my shirt tomorrow. I’d also like to add that I believe Zubar will be able to shake off those lapses of concentration, something unfortunately Naylor never really did.

It is strange that both games this week should have so clearly recalled the same ties from 7 years ago. Wolves went down that season – our ability to avoid the same fate this season hangs on our ability to cut out stupid errors at the back and to reproduce performances like this against the teams around us it the table.

I say we can do it!

While it may be true that this defeat leaves us free to concentrate on higher things (survival in this League being very much the priority), a defeat is never less than disappointing, and the manner of this defeat more so.

I’ve no doubt the players will pick themselves up and perform better than this on Wednesday, but after watching both teams’ futile punting and mispassing, the announcement after the match that we’ve signed Jamie O’Hara for the rest of the season was even more of a relief than it might have been on another day.

The first half was dismal, and I can suggest no nuggets of consolation to take from it for either set of fans, other than things can only get better. Fletcher hit the bar – a possible glimmer of hope, but he should have scored.

Stoke also gave us many reasons to regret not fielding a second string team as they did their best to kick chunks out of the boys in gold in front of a surprisingly lenient referee. It was fortunate more than anything that only Stephen Hunt joined the casualty list during the course of a very physical game.

Things improved a little in the second half, with Jarvis showing flashes of threat on the wing, but play was still characterised more by misplaced passes than anything else, on a very muddy pitch. Stoke had offered no more threat than we did, but it was Huth who got the simple head in in the 81st minute. Cue a little more urgency from Wolves and a seeming – and not unfair – reprieve in a 90th minute penalty. It was characteristic of our day that Milijas’s tame spot-kick was saved.

The most frustrating thing was the frequency with which we persisted in following a pattern of passing across the middle then back to Hahnemann, who more often than not was left to lump the ball back up to a Stoke player. This frustration was, however, both alleviated and exacerbated by the fact that Wolves did try other angles than route one, but proved equally unable to progress successfully into the Stoke final third. This was a problem of personnel rather than tactics – route one was a fall back because the team failed at anything more subtle.

They will be better on Wednesday, but a fine reason to be happy to see O’Hara join the team.

With ‘King Kenny’ yet to notch up a victory since his much-heralded return to the club, Liverpool will come to Molineux in a relatively lowly 13^th place and hoping for a little assistance from a rather leaky Wolves defence (38 goals conceded so far).  I always worry about of defence, who are often too willing to keep backing off players who run at them and prone to serious lapses of concentration, however, after no clean sheets in 16 games, we have three from the last six, so things are looking up.

Wolves are coming into the match off the back of a 5-0 drubbing of Doncaster in the Cup, and a pulsating but ultimately disappointing 4-3 loss to Man City in the League.  Had Tevez not been so good, and had our defence been, well, a little bit less scared of tackling him, we could have taken a point from the tie so I expect we’ll stick with the 4-4-2 that Mick McCarthy seems to have actually been able to make work of late after much trying.  Line up last time was:

Hennessey

Zubar – Berra – Stearman – Ward

Jarvis – Jones – Milijas – Hunt

Doyle – Fletcher

I doubt they’ll be much change from that given we’re still carrying still high number of injuries – possibly Henry in for Jones.  New signing from Barnsley, Adam Hammill, is likely to get a place on the bench, and we may see him for a sub appearance, depending how the match progresses.  Equally, it would be good to see Mujangi-Bia on the wing  at some point.  After a promising 10 minutes against Man City, he may have shown a little more enthusiasm than accuracy in front of goal against Doncaster in the week, but he’s earned a chance to show us a little more what he’s capable of.

Usual left-back (of late at least) Elokobi will be serving the last of a three match suspension so the more-than-versatile Stephen Ward, scorer of course of the winner at Anfield when he played up front, is likely to continue in the left-back slot.  He may put in some heroic last minutes tackles or he may back off his player until the ball sails into the back of the net.  Either is likely – that’s the way it goes.

Watch out for Jarvis on the wing.  He’s not quite lived up of late to his early season form that should have won him an England call up, but he can still give any defence a torrid time.  Milijas is our key player in the middle of the park – his ability this season to add real hard graft to good vision, accurate passing and a mean shot from distance has played a major part in whatever recent revival we have managed.

Up front, Doyle hasn’t scored many – two in the League so far, including one from the spot last week – but his all round play is central to many of the best spells of play we’ve seen this season.  Watch out too for Fletcher, who has mainly had opportunities from the bench this year, but has shown a good strikers instinct when called on.

Casing the opposition in the Kop, incognito, like

I’ve been to Anfield once this season – not as it happens to see Wolves’s recent victory unfortunately – but watching a see-sawing draw with Sunderland.  The main this I remember was the poisonousness of the atmosphere.  Dalglish’s appointment seems to have the effect of calming this, at least, which in the long term can only be good for LFC, and we should be wary.

So, as to the likely final result, Liverpool have plenty of quality – on their day Torres and Gerrard are among the best in the world (Glen Johnson less so) – happily, those days aren’t as common as they once were, and to counter that we have plenty of team spirit together with not a little quality of out own, as Liverpool have already witnessed to their disadvantage at Anfield this season.

We’re had a habit this season of saving our best performances for the big names, which, of course Liverpool are, if without a team with the confidence to live up to it.  Unfortunately this habit is counterbalanced by an opposing tendency to save our worst performances for the teams around us in the table, but that’s one for another day.

Liverpool will still be favourites going into this match, but the final outcome really is too close to call.  I can’t think of any time in the past 25 years that I could realistically have said that about this particular match up, which I’m chalking up as a major victory for Mick McCarthy already.

Here’s hoping for a great match, played in good-spirit and, most importantly, a(nother) fine victory for the boys in old gold and black.

Up the Wolves!