How Were This Little Lot For Openers?

Arsenal have featured relatively prominently on the list of eye-opening first-day statements from Wolves over the decades – and there will be another entry for that category if Gary O’Neil’s men emerge with a point or three on Saturday.

We have delved into the record books again and note that the club also recorded early (but not immediate) victories over this weekend’s opponents in 1968 and 1979.

The emphasis with this piece, though, is to see when Wolves made the football world sit up and take notice with opening-afternoon successes and we have come up with the following list.

August 31, 1946: Wolves 6 Arsenal 1 What a start to post-War football life at Molineux as Ted Vizard’s side, including a host of debutants, hammered opponents who ran away with the First Division title the following season.

August 23, 1958: Wolves 5 Nottingham Forest 1 Did life in these parts get much better than this? The East Midlanders would win the FA Cup in 1959 but were swept aside here by the reigning League champions.

August 18, 1962: Wolves 8 Manchester City 1 The club’s biggest ever first-day victory came against a club who had lost 5-1 at the same venue on kick-off afternoon six years earlier. No wonder City signed Jimmy Murray not long after.

August 24, 1963: Arsenal 1 Wolves 3 The Gunners were this time downed at Highbury, with Billy Wright, no less, as their manager. This was also the start of Stan Cullis’s last full Molineux season and cracks would soon show.

August 19, 1967: Fulham 1 Wolves 2 Not only were Wolves back in the top flight but they were competing and victorious after two seasons in the Second Division. That triumphant trip to America clearly had them up to speed!

August 29, 1981: Wolves 1 Liverpool 0 A Liverpool team in their title-winning pomp were sunk by a Mick Matthews winner even more remarkable for the fact the visitors would finish the campaign top and Wolves one place off the bottom.

August 9, 1997: Norwich 0 Wolves 2 The club had a run of eight first-afternoon victorious in nine seasons during the stagnation years and this one was illuminated by the debut at Carrow Road of the sensational, two-goal Robbie Keane.

August 14, 2010: Wolves 2 Stoke 1 In total contrast to the 1990s, Wolves went ten years without full points in the first fixture until this welcome win over old rivals who were more established in the Premier League than they were.