Tours are Us

United States, 1969

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.

Anglesey, 1989

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.

Far East & New Zealand, 1978

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.

Portugal, 2001

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.’

Yugoslavia, 1970

Testing Times For Weary Travellers

Wolves’ players were busy collecting stamps on their passports at the time they spread their wings in search of a fillip following a quite dreadful finish to their 1969-70 season. Having signed off the campaign with a 13-match run without a victory from which they still emerged with a final placing of 13th, they braced themselves for a summer of travelling across mainland Europe.

Air-Lift To Ireland

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.

Buckinghamshire/Kent, 1995

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.

USA/Canada, 1963

Air Miles And Victories In Abundance

Wolverhampton Wanderers had just finished the last of the many fine seasons they enjoyed under Stan Cullis when they headed across the Atlantic for the first time more than 46 years ago. Having twice visited South Africa in the previous decade and a bit and also played in Russia, the club found their plane pointing in another direction as they set off on a five-week trip that was to bring them nine wins and a draw from their ten matches.

USA, 1967

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.

Austria/Germany, 1998

An Ill Wind Blowing

Sir Jack Hayward once said that one of Mark McGhee’s greatest strengths was remembering the names of all the players he had signed for Wolverhampton Wanderers. It was less than veiled criticism of the Scot’s management of the club in 1998 after he had, shortly before their appearance in the FA Cup semi-final against Arsenal, unveiled five newcomers together – Steve Claridge, David Connolly, Robbie Slater, Stephen Wright and the returning Neil Emblen.