Highlights From The National Stage

As a way of filling the void while matches between countries have again taken over from those between clubs, how about these ten sizeable achievements by Wolves players in international football?

*Billy Wright, Ron Flowers, Norman Deeley and Peter Broadbent occupied the shirts numbered from five to eight respectively when England faced Brazil in Rio de Janeiro in May, 1959.

*Jack Smith, a Wolves full-back and later a trainer, had unusual international fortunes. He was pulled out of an England game in 1941-42 at only 48 hours’ notice when discovered to have played for Wales Schoolboys 15 years earlier.

*Stan Cullis became the first Wolves man to appear in a senior international at Wembley when he faced Scotland with England on April 9, 1938.

*Frank Munro and Jim McCalliog soon followed suit but Wolves did not have a full Scottish international until Hugh Curran faced Austria in Vienna on Bonfire Night, 1969.

*Steve Bull followed in the footsteps of only four others when he scored on his England debut. The only other players to do so are Jack Brodie, Tom Galley, Johnny Hancocks and Dennis Wilshaw.

*David Edwards is not co-commentating for Sky Sports on Wales’s game in Azerbaijan today. His club Shrewsbury have an FA Cup replay at Bradford in three days’ time, so it’s studio duty only for him rather than a long flight to Eastern Europe.

*Jimmy Mullen set a trend that has become commonplace many times over when, as replacement for Jackie Milburn in the 4-1 win over Belgium in Brussels in 1950, he became England’s first used substitute.

*Against Scotland and England in the 1970 Home International Championship, Derek Dougan was accompanied by Bertie Lutton – also then on Wolves’ playing staff – while former Molineux youngster David Clements appeared elsewhere in the line-up.

*Danny Hegan’s first two Northern Ireland caps were both against the USSR away – first as an Albion player and then, in the autumn of 1971, having recently enjoyed a hot scoring run of three Wolves goals in eight days.

*And, finally, this one is so special as to be very much worth repeating…..Wolves had one or more representative in every England side across 148 internationals and almost 25 years from the autumn of 1938 to the spring of 1963.