Keeper’s Memories Of Billy’s Other Side

Bob Wilson, Frank McLintock and Charlie George stand as three valuable legacies of Billy Wright’s one and only stint as a manager in club football.

The trio were among Billy’s signings in his four years in charge at Arsenal and all went on to figure with great prominence in the Gunners’ double-winning team of 1970-71.

We could add the recruitment of John Radford (as a professional), Joe Baker and Peter Simpson as further evidence that the Molineux great’s reign was not a total failure despite some Highbury regulars having a low opinion of it.

But an interesting take on his spell at the helm is available thanks to a man with much more tenuous Wolves connections than the 105-cap England star.

Keeper Wilson was recruited by him in 1963 following a promising spell as an amateur with Stan Cullis’s Wanderers and used his autobiography to refer to some ups and downs between the two.

What he called a ’24-carat row’ blew up after he had been dropped from the reserves to the third team following a 3-2 defeat against amateur club Hendon in the London Challenge Cup at Highbury.

He forcibly made his feelings known to the manager and recalled in print: “I continued to argue and Billy became as agitated as I was. He then accused me of looking at myself in the mirror and the red mist descended. Speechless and close to tears, I reached for the door and slammed it shut as I made my exit.”

Wilson, later a voice of considerable reason when following up his playing career with a long stint as a BBC presenter, stresses, though, that he had a strong liking for the man who died 30 years ago this month.  

He said there was no Churchillian speech from him when he was named for his first-team debut at home to Nottingham Forest but said he was ‘always so full of good intentions’ and ‘deserving of a better reward as a manager for his goodness.’

The keeper was beaten on day one by ex-Wolves winger Dick Le Flem and a striker who pitched up at Molineux a couple of years later, Frank Wignall. But the Gunners were four up by then and cruising.

And Wilson’s satisfaction at figuring in a 4-2 victory was tempered by the fact he quickly returned to the shadows and played only nine more First Division games in the next four and a half years.

Bertie Mee, a physio under Wright, was very much in control of team affairs when the former Loughborough student became a regular in the first team and there were clearly no hard feelings over the mid-1960s dressing-room clash.

“Billy was not the type of man who enjoyed rows and I’m sure he disliked our shouting match as much as anyone,” he added. “I learned later that he had sort of admired my spirit.

“The argument never clouded our relationship. It was all about his burning desire to succeed as a manager and an equal ambition of mine to be the best.

“We had our ups and downs but, to my mind, he was always the the man who believed in me enough to bring me to Highbury and who persuaded me to turn professional. He was heartbroken at his sacking and was deemed a failure.

“But his legacy was rich in promise and had a huge bearing, albeit four years later, on the club’s greatest season to date.”

Readers might enjoy reading this piece from well over a decade ago Bob Wilson OBE And His Molineux Years – Wolves Heroes and seeing proof that while the Molineux squad thought the world of John Ireland, not everyone was a fan!