Time to start smashing shit up

Well, we knew it would happen one day didn’t we? The fucking Lizards want their own environment, their own trough to stick their snouts in and nobody else is allowed, no, just them bastards. Super League? How many times have you bought ‘Super Glue’ or ‘Super’ anything and expected it to be nothing but a waste of arse wax? So we wave goodbye to the ‘Top six’ English Premier League teams. Good, what was our experience of going to watch Wolves against these creme de la creme of footballing sides? Errant decisions weighted heavily in their favour, prima donna players who fall over if you as much as dented their trims, the atmosphere. God help us, the atmosphere. Like Aunti Doris’s funeral, like having a wank and all you have is a well thumbed copy of Razzle that’s an absolute work out for our imaginations. Manchester City/United. Tombs mate. Memorials to what football used to be like, as dynamic an occasion as the bronze statuary plonked in the front of abstract, lifeless stadiums. Boring and very shit. Is this a good thing? Well….

For a start it’s very interesting that an American criminal enterprise is funding this shift in power. JP Morgan the Bank. All of us probably have some interaction with these wankers in one form or another. They were the movers and shakers in the first world war. Lending money to the German, French and British governments so they could have some of the battles that marked some of the worst casualty figures of that war. The Somme, Verdun the names just roll off the tongue. All made possible with JP Morgan money. Not a good narrative is it? These people are animals, trust me. Football is not important to them…now I could fill this blog up with shit about the complexities and the like of this Super League shit but I’m not. I’m not even going to wax too much about Fosun missing the boat. That would have been heart breaking. But not that much. We already know that as a bog standard football fan nobody loves us. Not even Fosun. It’s a shame we have missed the great cock measuring presentation Wolves would have put on. Samosa Gandalf walking around like he started the club in 1877. Suzi Perry gurning at everything. Jaqui Oatley smooching about probably with Britney and Boro Judah lurking about. Everybody would be back slappy and happy. Jeff would be wandering around looking like he doesn’t quite know what’s going on…fucking hell. Is this what we have become when these light weights are what people think we are? Jeff would have had that contract signed so fast it would seem like his signature would have just magically appeared.

It will die a death of course, it has to. The dynamics of these Lizards is uncreative and dull. They see personal positions of power becoming more solidified. They see cash money flying in, they see themselves as atop some sort of pile or other. They sit and count their cash with dull eyes and very sticky fingers. But they will die. They can’t create they can only sell what us, me and you make. What do I mean by that? Football is us. Me and you. The club is there purely as a catch all for the often disparate fanbases. Wolverhampton Wanderers for instance is really just a name for the people that it deems to represent. Us. Our history. This is what makes teams attractive to people from other countries. If they decide to follow and English club it will be a pre requisite to understand some of the history, I don’t mean cups, honours, trophies. I mean rivalry, hate, love. All the interesting football things. A player will never become a hero to people when all he has is a shiny video and a show reel of goals etc. A hero becomes a hero only when we, the fans can identify some of the Heroes struggles with our own. We make these heroes. Not the Media. We create everything. The songs, the madness, the spectacle. It’s all us, never them. They are the timetable writers and the Gonks. They are the people with great video software, the people with shit podcasts. The people like the Press, the Lizards who run the big six. All products of the bankers now and the money men. We know why you have to break away and start deeply sucking that JP Morgan Satan dick mate. You haven’t got any money. You spent it all trying to keep your snout in the trough and you have failed. Manchester City aside the big six is just a list of dying clubs. I intimated the same thing in the second of the Nuno books. Dying clubs because simply, they have lost touch with what makes them a great football club. Us again.

With the hate over VAR and other issues we have been a bit cut off haven’t we? As these people slowly try to destroy what we have made over the years. Are we going to put up with it? Nah of course not. Fucking Wolves ay we? What should be the strategy? OK. Here’s an idea. When we eventually get let back into the ground we should do a number of things. Don’t like a VAR decision? Lets get on the pitch for ten minutes and smash every piece of VAR gear they have there. I mean totally destroy it, fling it to the side, walk back into the stand and wait for the footy to restart. Put a mask on so you cant be identified. Get back in the stand quick. We will look after you. Don’t like Stockley park? Lets get everyone down there for a demo, maybe things would get out of hand and there could be a possibility that the place gets burned down to the ground. God forbid. Don’t like the way the television media moves games? Don’t watch them. Tell companies involved in advertising on these football shows you will not buy another product if they continue to do so. Still annoyed? God forbid someone vandalises one of those expensive camera trucks outside the ground. We don’t want that. What if these vox pop camera crews from Sky or the BBC are seen around a ground. Get involved, stop them interviewing, stop them doing their jobs. Stop them feeding off football. They want an opinion on the match? Don’t give them one. Do they support the formation of a European Super League? If they do they are the enemy. Start to draw lines in the sand. Start getting in their fucking faces. Get active. Make badges, Tshirts, start writing blogs, start getting angsty and angry. Start fucking fighting back. What about the doughnut wearing a traitor club shirt? Let them know they are a wanker. Laugh at them, point your finger at them, accuse, vilify. Time to attack brothers and sisters…(and those that are in between.) We’ve had it done to us so lets start doing it back. The thing is…if they attack us then we have to attack back don’t we? Isn’t that self defence? Something we love is being killed off and you expect us to grip our piss water partner brand 8 quid beer while we hold a forlorn, shitty ten quid burger in our hand while wearing our 80 quid club approved shirt and you cant sing until the club approved MC in front of the ‘WOLFPACK’ singing section starts bellowing shit songs through his club approved megaphone. They will probably get Mikey Burrows to do that to be honest. Wave your approved flags then exit the stadium in an approved manner…Jesus Christ. Fuck off.

How much do they expect us to take before things start getting horrible? It’s warfare isn’t it? Really. I love a scrap I do. Never happier when I’m in a strange pub with 60 against 6 before a game and it kicks off. These money men and the whole idea of these bastards trying to take away the game I love fills me with rage not fear. I don’t fucking care about your media events and your slick marketing. I don’t care about the fucking Gonks you parade around in front of us. Where were they years ago when things were shit. I’ve never seen Samosa Gandalf before Nuno came. I never saw any of these Gonks at Aldershot, Crewe, Carlisle, Millwall. Who the fuck are these people? Trough snufflers mate. You want a fucking fight I will give you one if you want. Plans are afoot, emails have been exchanged, information passed on. You lot operate on a bloody rarified platform but that platform is built on sand and mine are on solid ground, my stand, my stadium and my team, my brothers and sisters in the stands. Nah you will never beat us because we are the people that make things. We are the people that create. In this madness of being a Wolves man or woman the club entwines itself in everything we do and it becomes a focal point for our dreams, loves and hopes. We pin fucking everything on it until we cant see ourselves as being separate from our club. But you can’t love something that doesn’t have a soul. Franchise football eh? When will Liverpool move to Miami? When will Manchester United move to India or China? Then what will these cities have? Nothing at all. The succulent meat of the European Super League will turn to ashes in their mouths.

Don’t lose heart. Moan all you want, that’s good, it means we are talking and exchanging ideas. Don’t engage with the fans of the six traitors. There is no point. They have fast tracked themselves into the future and that future aint bright my friends. It is dark and there will be casualties. They are now pariahs and I hope they gain something on these strange JP Morgan built roads they are on…but I doubt it. Don’t lose heart. In the future it may be seen that FosunWolves will make a move to join this super league and the club will become even more detached from us than it already is. That’s cool. Because we are still here and we will just replace the club name you have stolen off us with another one, then make that Wolverhampton, make that Wulfrunian make it something to do with us not you. It’s time for a dictatorship of the fanbase. It’s time for us to make our voices heard. Support your team. Support Nuno. Watch Fosun with a crinkly eye.

Wolves V Sheffield United

DANPOD

So often those hustling for the win must
clamp down grim mindings in their coffer,
just as I ought fetter my inborn conceit,
often wounded, wanting where I know,
kindred pulled away, how many winters now?
I shrouded my giver in dark earth
and wended away worrisome,
weather-watching the wrapful waves,
hall-wretched, seeking a center,
far or near, where they might be found,
in some mead-hall, who knows of my kind,
willing to adopt a friendless me,
though they be joyful enough.

The Wanderer..an old Anglo Saxon Poem

Walking the dogs past the Albion (The Lancaster) yesterday was really weird. It was sunny and fresh, bright sunny, that sun you forgot about over winter. Warm, there was beer too, everybody sat outside having a gargle in the sun. Warm, beautiful Wolves shirts dotted here and there. I felt weird you know. Because all of a sudden shit seemed normal again and I was taken aback by it. It was the Wolves shirts. They fucking glowed and hurt my eyes. Memories just whizzed through my head like when you hear a tune you haven’t heard for a long time and it takes you back to another time. Insane. I pulled the dogs away. Was it time to relax? I am starting to. Things are starting to feel familiar again. More traffic, more shouty angst, more people everywhere. Lock down easing. Wolves shirts. Loads of them and I have a bit of a fill up and the tears make all the shirts in the beer garden glow like big golden stars.

Sheffield United are fucked for sure. We play them at the Molineux. The game, well it was a typically obtuse performance again where nothing seemed to be flowing, nothing had colour in it, not many passes and not many moves. United are slipping down to the Championship and do you know the weird thing? Their fans are not that fussed. The whole season has been pretty strange for them. The VAR crap, the Refereeing decisions, the goals chalked off. You know the lyrics to this one. It’s been a bad experience for them and I am truly sorry for that. Even if it isn’t my fault. That’s the problem when you let bean counters and suits run the game. But we have a chance again, to become what we were and to blaze shapes and runs everywhere, to tease and to…ok that isn’t going to happen. Instead, three points, that’s it. Three points and a bit crawlier up the table to nestle under the arm pit of other safe teams. Poor Sheffield United. It’s always Wolves that piss on their Parsnips. Weird because even if I hate most clubs I have always had a soft spot for Sheffield, probably because we beat them in most important games we play them…but Sheffield is a great night out. I know people there. They are good people. But I’m waving at them as they tumble. We can’t have friends here in this cauldron of English top flight football. No back slaps just goodbyes.

There are moments of course. Semedo physical and at the same time unassuming, again intelligence and creative movement sullied by that shitegeist around the team at the moment. He moves and the silence around him is like a duvet or a joy killing blanket. The medium that Nuno uses to splash his art across is quite absent. That medium being ‘football’ in the smallest and greatest of senses. At the Macro level, us. At the Micro level him and the team. Now I understand it totally for the first time watching Nuno in the presser where he looks like he could be anywhere else if he could fielding the sort of questions only dull people ask. He doesn’t trust the Press any more than he did when he came here. Of course you can lay out a detailed thesis for every question asked but what’s the point? Nuno again is suffering the slings and arrows of his outrageous fortune to paraphrase William Shakespeare a famous Wolves fan. He’s dead now of course but his ghost still wanders the dark damp places under the South Bank. Slings and bloody arrows. Neto, Jonny, Raul, and throw in some other names. Physical injuries, stuff that can be put right under a Surgeons knife but the mental stuff? The times this player or that looks in the mirror every morning before a match and tries to get his head in some sort of order, to get his mind ready for the game. But of course we know well enough if you get eleven good mates together as a group then look at each one closely. What problems have they faced over the past few weeks? I bet you any money a few of them will have some major life shit going on. A couple will have a depression or mental issue that bad it will be a victory for them just to comb their hair and put some clean clothes on to go out. How do they do it these human beings? Looking at eleven random blokes then at our team I wonder which one has the strength to just appear at Molineux?

There is us of course. The great unwashed waxing our own sweet lyrics about what should be done with this squad and manager. I tend to look at positive things, to hope and to pray, to nourish little seedlings into big strong plants. I can’t speak for others only to say that they suffer too, we all suffer. But the positives. Conor Coady deserves a fucking medal. How he keeps this squad motivated and together has to be one of the most brilliant things to happen to the Wolves this season. His man management must be off the fucking scale. He himself would have struggled a little trying to get his head around this madness and still have the mental energy to keep the squad alive. Last few blogs I have moaned about how the players seem to always smile while we are suffering. But I have had a rethink. I am now of the opinion that they smile, laugh and joke purely because that’s the way a massive human like Coady activates positivity when all seems dark and dim. As well as trying to galvanise hope within the squad he has had to deal with his own personal madness, an England call up. He has to try and play his football within an extremely dysfunctional framework of the England set up. Then Coady absolutely destroys the role, looks like he grew there, scores a goal even. On top of being Wolves Captain and Juju wizard. Gob smacked mate. So my player of the Season? Conor Coady. I know there are flashier players, I know there are sexier players in our team but he is a pillar of strength this bloke. I wish I had a Trophy to give him but you can’t quantify class mate.

Daniel Podence too. Who even gives him much of a thought? His first season here has been strange. But Dan, thats Wolves mate, that’s just how things happen here. But he pulls his boots on again and gets out there, runs those legs all over the show. It isn’t happening yet Dan Podence, but it will. So I am less critical than of late and I understand more, I have become a bit more empathic not with the strange football we are playing but the players as human beings. I suspect that human quality has been seen on our hallowed pitch more than a few times this season. As much with Nuno as with the team. It has been rough but there have been no major meltdowns, no major plunge in form, no off field insanity. But there have been smaller stories of course and we only really get to sense a few of them in discrete coded messages and social media posts. These small stories tend to build up until everything becomes loose and bitter…but not here, not at Wolves.

I am happy Willian scored. His goal gave us three points and we must thank him for that. Would I have him in the team? I think I would yes. He has had his foundational experience in Premier League football. It is very different to European football isn’t it? There must be time to adjust and get a grip on the whole show. He has had this now. What will be his response? More goals I suspect. More insanity. I would love to see him with confidence and a full Molineux behind him. Then we may say and wax lyrics about him. Until then we must hush and watch. Indeed watch every player in their insanity. Watch Ayit Nouri, watch Semedo, watch Dan Podence, watch Willian. Watch and hope, watch and pray that they find their juju…

“Where has the horse gone?
Where are my kindred?
Where is the giver of treasure?
Where are the benches to bear us?
Joys of the hall to bring us together?
No more, the bright goblet!
All gone, the mailed warrior!
Lost for good, the pride of princes!

“How the space of years has spread —
growing gloomy beneath the night-helm,
as if it never was!

This Juju, this Kwan. The team twist and turn to find it not really knowing that they already possess it. I suspect that they will find it next season. You can’t emerge out of this fire of VAR, the plague, the lockdown, and a mad world without being changed by it. These games are the flame of our intent for how we will play our football next year. We now know that yes, of course we can suffer bad football, we can writhe in pain from injury, we can walk away from games sad and depressed but we can also shithouse a rersult sometimes, we can burrow into the Molineux turf and grab hold of a victory despite being obtuse and angular in our play. Next season. Fabio on the pitch next to Raul. Fabio technical as fuck, a footballing brain but a sensitive young one that must be handled very fucking carefully. Would I have chucked him on at the start? No I wouldn’t have. This season is done, why risk this Fabio with opponents such as Sheffield United who writhe and squirm in their pain? Keep him safe, give him minutes of experience that’s it. Gently ease him into this world of Wolves. I imagine him and Raul doing those crazy things in an opposition box. The balls Raul used to play as he held the ball up looking. He will see Fabio next season in space, he will slide the ball to him across the box. Fabio will plant it. Limbs, insanity, falling over seats, Nuno did have a dream and it’s slowly coming true, I can feel it.

How will we react? We will forget this season of course. The Plague season. It means nothing. Transition means exactly that, from the horizontal to the vertical and I can see no greater example of it than this season. I think Nuno and his team have already seen what they need to see and the focus now will be on Pre Season and who will be there. Will Adama be here? I hope so. He is still one of the greatest talents I have seen at Molineux and I still love him although I can also fall out with him. It’s a relationship you know. His play again last night in parts, speechless, in others a cacophony of opinions. What a mercurial character, what a member of the squad.

Things are slowly going back to some sort of normality. A bloke in the pub beer garden trips up with his pint trying to distangle himself from the picnic table. Beer everywhere. Everyone laughs including me. He laughs too. Get another beer in mate. The sun is shining. I think this season is done and dusted. Cross the T’s and dot the i’s my friends. All that money you saved this season you will be needing for the season after next when you will be walking the cobbles of a European city again. Put a tenner on it.

FOSUN

I am a simple man. The world of high finance and business rarely interest me but when it come to my Citys Football team I will bend the odd eye at an article or a clickbait tweet. Because what lies in between the words and the narrative in any article concerning finance you can extrapolate into the real world and perhaps, sometimes you can order your view and hopes for your team by finding the words that aren’t there. Last week I kept getting old fashioned emails off a dude who keeps talking about Fosun and what they are about and what they want for the future. I replied tersely and was abrupt. It was boring. Until I noticed that between her words there were meaty morsels of information that could only come from inside Fosun itself. Now it was interesting because it was like spying…that was very interesting.

So I try to ascertain what the groove was in terms of questions people were asking about Fosuns long term plans. She is very happy to reply. She’s Chinese you see. Happy. A football fan. A Wolves fan. I tell her I will write about it. She is unhappy…but happy again all of a sudden. I wonder whether she is a Spy herself….a disinformation agent. She rang me up last night and we spend an hour and a half talking about Fosun and Bees. Don’t ask.

So I want to know broadly about Fosuns intent and we go back to the halcyon days of Moxey and Morgan. Fosun wanted a club in Europe. Something they could build onto and up. Some club to develop. Fosun look at perhaps 30 clubs. A list if you will. Then Fosun get to work finding out the zeitgeist of every club. It’s capacity and footprint to build on ‘History’ and ‘Brand’. They see Wolves on the list and the further the process of elimination goes the more Wolves seem to weather the Fosun means test. We tick boxes for them.

The modus operandi is looking for a club that fits into the framework and the model they have chosen to emulate. Because despite the economic power of China, they cannot create. But once a creation is there, then there is no one like the Chinese to manage and grow. Fosun look at teams like Leicester, Dortmund and Red Bull Leipzig. This is the model they will follow. There will not be big sums of money to spend because the keyword is not spend but to invest and grow. Financial controls mean that they will not come in with huge amounts to lather the club with. Everything must be sustainable. Everything must have strict controls. Build and manage effective strategies to explode into the big six and financial rewards. Fosun have a debt to equity ratio of (at the time of writing) 0.54 which means everything is looking very good…you see a score of 0.5 is extremely healthy and as a side note the gearing ratio for Wolves is 0.34 which is hard nipple territory. But Fosun also have a flexibility to their strategy. Same thing I was talking about in regards the team. Small and flexible, adaptable and tactile. Fosun use the strategy of using Insurance premiums for their investments. Adaptability? The Moody downgrade of Fosun last year would have had serious implications for Fosuns investments in the squad. Adaptability meant that they were able to get that Moodys downgrade reversed in a matter of weeks. As above so below. The Macro and the micro we see major global decisions and policy used on a world stage and a football one.

But as Fosun are closely linked with the politics of China how may that effect the club. We are tangled in geopolitics that’s for sure, Anything that affects the Chinese government also affects Wolves. Closely watch what’s happening in Taiwan and Australia. India and South America in regards to Chinese government policy. Remember as above so below, we can again extrapolate bigger solutions to smaller problems. Wolves fans of course and to be honest most football fans are interested in what happens on the pitch rather than around it but we must have some idea of these lofty ideals by big entities such as Fosun to glean information about what may possibly happen in the future. We have seen the ‘velvet glove’ purchases of PSG and Manchester City with Saudi money, we have seen the House of Saud interested in Newcastle and other English clubs. Middle Eastern money is not Chinese money. We must stop trying to equate their business models with what Fosun and Wolves are doing. Even with a generalised idea of Chinese investment we can start to get a grip on who stands where on the world stage but we can also look at Chinese investment in football and see that again there are also subsets and divisions of thought. There is a type of errant Chinese investment. The type of investment in football clubs that doesn’t really have any kind of strategy like Fosun. I see you Tony Xia and Carsten Yeung. I see you emulating the House of Saud model but without the constant flow of cash. They don’t have the backing of their government like Fosun do. The intricacies of Fosun are an almost perfect reflection of the intricacies of their government. There has been scrutiny of Chinese ownership of Football clubs over the past few years. Heavy scrutiny with the odd note here and there of a subtle racism from certain members of the press and speaking heads in politics. We see departures from Athletico Madrid, Aston Villa, Sparta Prague and a signalled attempt to depart on behalf of Suning in regards to Inter Milan. We see the Chinese flexing their muscles on an over the top TV deal with the EPL and again reading between the lines we see that the Chinese are in the room, sat at the big table, elbows jostling at the trough. Heads banging together. A perfect reflection as I said of Chinese government policy being performed on a micro scale as regards club football.

We see these moves every day in the press. We will see in the future some extremely negative news as regards Fosun and Wolves. We see this already as we watch Match of the Day and other big media platforms seemingly uninterested in our journey and our struggles, our victories. We see snide comments, hear weird abstract and negative things on radio. We see Leeds slathered in an almost sexual manner by Pundits but us? Nothing. Why is this? Read above. The Established order of fat white men at the FA walk the same carpets as members of the state. The narrative comes from them. They do not like Fosun. They are wary of the Chinese government big thoughts of the Lizards in Government are the little thoughts of the Newt brained idiots in the media and FA hierarchy. Western Liberalism versus Chinese totalitarianism. Wolves in the middle being tugged this way and that. How long will Fosun stay in this fight? On the small scale the fight is exactly the same as the one happening right now in the South China sea. The endgame will be fascinating.

I understand China better than most I suppose. Coming from a Multi cultural area and City has allowed me to have long standing friends who are Chinese. I have worked in partnership with Academics at major Chinese Universities. I am familiar with obscure Chinese history and Literature, it’s art and it’s culture. Do I understand the Chinese? Of course I do. What do I think?

The Chinese Government are patient. Fosun are patient too. They know to make things grow they have to be nurturing, gentle and indeed patient. Something not seen in football at any level. We seethe and we moan as we see players come and go. Jota to Liverpool was less a loss than a statement of intent for Fosun. We sell players to clubs we compete with and that means we will invest the money in other players better, more suited to the way Nuno wants to play. But to make them better players they have to be developed and nurtured too and then they will be sold. There are no more heroes any more The Stranglers warbled long ago. They are right. We will of course have heroes in the team…on our level, on our understanding. But these players are commodities, they are things to be moved around dynamically in order to develop the idea and the finances to grow and dominate football. FosunWolvesGroup are developing ‘presence’ in dynamic young arenas. Esports, Fashion, Media. Fast moving areas of growth for the future. Bench marks of a progressive policy many House of Saud clubs lack. We see Fosuns intent reflected in how they pick and choose figureheads for their club/media/fan events. It is obvious that their latest figurehead is divisive and negative within a portion of our fanbase but you know…that Indian Dollar is a big dollar. India will be a huge market for Fosun and the concerns of the fans unimportant on the larger scale. What about the rest of the World? South America. USA, Africa? What about Eastern Europe which is destined to be the next growth area in terms of disposable income. Fosun will slowly move into these areas and this blog this whole Southbank Resistance thing is doing the same. As above so below. I have made contacts with football fans in India, Peru, Argentina, Brazil, Poland, Slovakia, Russia, Chile, USA, and China itself. They all read this blog and more continue to read and become fans the more I write, the more I act like Fosun. Brexit will mean we look around the world for opportunity and seize it. A global network if you will. Build it and be like them.

This season has seen mistakes in the way Fosun have run the club. The small scale squad, some of the new players, the communications have been awful. The next five years will see some of our best players move clubs and generate cash. We will be sad and there will be horrendous fumes but we must look at the bigger picture. Nuno, Jeff and Uncle Jorge Mendes are the Holy Trinity at Wolves and they must be on top of their game in the next few years. Hard work is good but learning from your mistakes is better. Learning and taking on board the lessons they have learned. I think Nuno is the best Coach in the World at this moment because he is the only one who truly understands what Fosun want and at the moment what Fosun wants is what Nuno wants. We as fans…what do we want? The same I think and as we travel along the paths Fosun forges we are going to have a lot of questions for ourselves. How do we move forwards? We have to emulate Fosun. Grow, adapt, challenge and evolve. We are not important to Fosun, we have seen that with their choice of figureheads but we can make ourselves important. We can make ourselves stronger, challenge Fosun and Wolves, challenge their narrative. We hold our clubs history in our bones and Fosun will never take that away from us. But if they want our history they will also have to come and talk to us at some point. Make contacts with other fan groups around the world, try and make sure behind all the glitzy videos and often blunt communications these people will at first see…underneath is a far more interesting Wolves experience and a chance to tell these new fans around the world really what we are. Stop arguing with each other and organise. Organise events and make charity fund raising ideas, make music and art, if you can’t do that then support people that do. Support each other and maybe we can add our voice to the great symphony of FosunWolves attempt to dominate world football.

If you like this article then how about supporting it a bit? In the close season there are going to be big changes to it. Redesign, a shop, a section for more diverse writing. Buy a tshirt or something. Maybe this one…in 1988 I joined a Photography course with one problem. I didn’t have a camera. So I ran down to Antiques and Collectables in Worcester street and I bought a broken Russian camera from 1942. I took it home, stripped it, fixed it, loaded it and took it behind the Northbank to maybe photograph our team. This was one of the shots I took and made into a tshirt. Stevie Bull himself. A bit knackered waiting for the ball. The arse end of the Northbank. An old mini. A crowd. Chuck me £15 and £3 p+p to my paypal kingofmercia@googlemail.com tell me the size you want…get one size larger, and I will send you one. Thank you for reading X

Tarquins V Wolves

Well, apologies to everybody for my rant about the West Ham game. We all have to lose it at some point and to be honest it’s only maybe the second or third time I have lost my nut since we started. What can I say? I was annoyed. More chilled out now. Looking forwards to the match against the Tarquins. What great days out they are but it wont be a shame to watch them plummet away into the Championship. Three points. Three dirty points absolutely levered out of Craven Cottages dank depressing pitch, three points levered from the sticky fingers of the dome headed criminals at Stockley park, prised from the fat pudgy crooked fingers of the FA, pulled from the pantomime actors we call officials. Scott Parker wearing a jumper a Russian in 1982 would think twice about putting on.

So Gibbs White has a trundle out and gets an errant foot to just tickle him off his centre of balance. He goes flat but the ball is away to Fabio who inserts it right at Traore who absolutely darts the ball near post right into the net at the death. We win. Dirty win, graspy and weird, but a win. I mean it’s never drab watching Wolves, there are times when of course you tend to watch the lone sea gull flying around the flags on the New Stand and you slurp and dribble a bit but on the whole Wolves do have a propensity to startle you with a goal or some play that’s worth watching. I mean Jose scored. Fucking hell. I actually laughed it was so weird. Header as well. Of course the poor bastard had it disallowed. VAR eh? Absolutely destroying football. The most important part of football, the goal, has been rendered down into an absolutely shit arse empirical circle jerk for geeky fucking paedophiles at Stockley Park. Don’t tell me for one minute that these decisions are in any way part of a process to make the game fairer. But you can tell me about suspicious companies based in Holland with a shareholder list that’s protected better than the Crown Jewels. Bent as fuck and you can’t tell me any different. It’s crooked, it stinks and it’s going to lose fans. There should be at least a Government level enquiry but then again we know how bent government enquiries are don’t we? What’s to do? I’m not sure.

David Coote had a riot didn’t he? The standards in officiating these games is very poor. Normally I’m quite reserved when it comes to Refs…apart from Witton Atwell. But Coote? Mate? Why? You only work one day a week you prick, at least get some of the decisions correct and if not correct ignored purely to keep the flow of the game moving. Exasperated I am. At the point when you’ve argued that much the only recourse is to start throwing punches around. But there’s no one here.

Ait-Nouri had another good game. He’s starting to get an idea of the rhythm here, the way of the Wong. Many times last night I watched his positioning and his comms with other players. What I saw was good and wholesome. You see I have a faint suspicion that Semedo and Ait-Nouri are the actual pinch point of the whole shape and movement of the side. If there is intent from them, then things start to move and the dysfunction of the team at the moment is trying to get both Semedo and Ait-Nouri moving in shape and getting the team to respond also and the other way round too. But let me wash this around my mind a little and watch more of them before I state it as a matter of fact. I liked Gibbs Whites appearance. Now his Social Media shenanigans apart I think he does have a place in this team. I think he might be exactly what we need in midfield. A bit of mad shit, a bit of crazy, still shapey but quite happy to make a move here and there, take people on. To be honest it’s nice to see a face play for us that understands a little about what it means to be a Wolf. I felt quite warm when he trotted on in place of a still healing DanPod who himself had a reserved but solid game up front. Fair play Gibbo I want to see more of this madness.

But ya know I’m glad Traore got a flea up his arse for once. Cracking goal but these last two games has reminded me about the bloke at work who does fuck all all week then when the Gaffer graces us with his presence on the shop floor said dude starts working like a fucking dervish. Who is this Traore? Galloping around into space looking like he knows what he’s doing. I mean I wax about him a lot, slag him off a lot since someone said he didn’t want to play for us any more. But this looks like a player that does want to be here…then he doesn’t…then he does…then he doesn’t again. Your heart gets ripped this way and that and to be honest I think Traore is Gas lighting us so you can’t trust any of your mental decisions you have made about his ability and drive. So Traore is just Traore. Great goal. Like a bullet. Cheers mate.

That through ball by Fabio tho. Ay. It was beyond describing. Now that is a ball. Of course we can’t have heroes in the team now we know they are just here to increase their value before they get sold but I hope we see more of his madness next season before he gets packed off to a big six club or Spain. But really there will be no Hero worship, no car park photos of Fabio, no Tshirts, no books. He will be here like a fling with a beautiful blonde several pay grades above you. We will fawn and suck our bellies in a bit but she will be gone like a brief spell of sunshine before the cold North winds start to buzz through your coat. Watching Wolves will be like sipping a coffee on some Barcelona street and watching beautiful people walk past and we nod and say Good Morning and they will be off up the street disappearing into the crowd never to be seen again. But like they say it’s better to have loved and lost than never loved at all but I would love a Hero and for all his frailties we had a Steve Bull for a while…the last hero? Apart from Dave Edwards….?

Thought Semedo had a good game here. He’s had some stick lately but Coady is being a Captain here and constantly cajoling and ordering Semedo into and out of position so Coady has one eye on the shape and one eye on Semedo as well as marshalling Mitrovic the organ thief into areas of neutral play where he can’t move. In all the defence here has kind of consolidated itself a little better and there is a kind of response to changes of shape dictated by the play further up the field. What was the formation at the start 4-3-2-1? Something like that? Then Neto limping off forced Donk to drop back but at least it forced some sort of player response. Willian scores…I had to say it again so I believe it. Of course we can’t be unfair with him but we can moan a bit for sure. Loved that he scored then the poor bastard gets it disallowed. Oh My Days. Who knows if he will be here next season. Again I am unmoved by any move for him. He hasn’t lit me on fire to be honest. But he reflects perfectly the ‘shitegeist’ of the season as a whole.

We weren’t Wolves for sure. There is nothing dynamic about any of our play at the moment but I think it’s there lurking just under the mist of oil that flies off Adamas arms as he runs. The thing is…is it just us looking for those glints of light through not exactly black clouds but certainly dull insipid ones. This team seems like it could really explode into something exciting, something insane, all the signs are there. We have nearly finished another season in the Premier League. We have survived this Plague season reasonably intact where others have floundered and died so it’s not all bad news. At the moment we are estranged from the team and the team are estranged from playing the football we know they are capable of. I will be glad when this is over and we can go back in. I think as unimportant that great global entity FosunWolves thinks we are, the team have missed us and I think maybe even Nuno too. Around all the blather about the Plague and VAR and Professional football I suspect the most important thing, us, is missing. We need to know about our team, we have to share the same battleground as them, feel the same joy and anger that our Manager and Coach has. Take that away and yes, football is an abstract thing that was once beautiful and lively and insane but now is like watching a tremendously glitchy football game. But Jesus Christ Scott Parkers jumper. Fucking hell.

So what have we got to look forwards to in the next few weeks. The team has responded to the West Ham defeat ok. Things could be moving into Kwan territory in August…We could see the shit relegated…who has done the math here? Can we relegate them? When we play them? Here’s a chance for our season to end in some positivity and a great chance for whoever seals their relegation to be treated as at least some sort of hero by us, a chance for a player to be lifted to some sort of cult status. I will be up Molineux for that game mate…

Wolves V West Ham

Fingles

“The nation that will insist on drawing a broad line of demarcation between the fighting man and the thinking man is liable to find its fighting done by fools and its thinking done by cowards.”

― William Francis Butler, Charles George Gordon

I wonder lately whether watching Wolves on the Laptop or on TV has altered our opinions when watching a match. Is it a ‘Goldfish’ bowl where we are allowed to watch replays and reruns of incidents as well as the nitty gritty pass here and there. Has that forensic watching made us more critical? I’m watching it closely of course as ya do. Face pressed up the screen but I don’t shout and scream any more, I don’t seem to be involved at all and any regular readers of this blog will notice this shit has happened before but I’ve never felt it as deeply as now. Everything has gone a bit wrong. The club refuses to speak to the fans unless it is in glitzy sparkly videos or another fucking video of Compton where the players are having a right laugh…everybody is having a right laugh in fact. Everybody except us. We sit in our shit box houses and watch, seethe and hate. Why do FosunWolves hate us? What have we done? What’s happened to the team? Don’t you want to play for us any more? Is that Gold shirt too heavy?

Are we so horrible, us fans, that we are treated like this? I don’t think we have annoyed anyone at the club surely? We have behaved ourselves. Did what we were supposed to do and join in with the fun even if it is like having a quick wank looking through the patio doors of the funky orgy going on in the living room. It all happened pretty much without us. We were there of course, we are always here, always taken for granted too. It isn’t COVID either…I think there’s some element of Lockdown that has curtailed some heavily safeguarded event a few selected fans can attend…but looking back I think we all saw the storm clouds coming. To many this ‘blip’ is just an errant series of games and the injuries just bad luck. But we know what these blips turn into don’t we? Headlong tumbles into the nether regions of the League. We don’t know what’s going on. Fosun have made a void and we are filling it with our own madness and I will be honest, its fucking unsustainable. Add in this fucking great communication problem and a poor run of form becomes a full scale metaphysical riot of incriminatory backwards and forwards bullshit on Social Media

I know West Ham have hard ons, they have chipped away at the league in a workmanlike manner. Point here point there, three here. Of course they would have a pop at us and they did. Our defence is a shock lately and I am dumbfounded to be honest. What a state of affairs. When I was teaching we had a new kid in class. You know what 14 year olds are like, mental, this one had grey hairs in his beard. Hard life in Syria mate. I feel like that with many of our players. I don’t think they are really who they are supposed to be. Fair enough a jink here and a run there, a goal and we all get hard nipples thinking about our future with them. But our future isn’t theirs. I get the feeling they are treading water here. Last night was all gumph from our forwards. Chances, fluffed chances, low morale, loss of form. Willian is becoming funnier the more I see of him. Please put him out of his misery and send him home. But I can’t just pick on him. Traore started to throw some shapes of course, his assist was God level stuff. But I get the feeling it wasn’t really for the teams benefit more it was good for his YouTube videos or his new club to be. He turns up for a few seconds and then it’s back to the same old Traore. I know he may be missing Raul and possibly much of Adamas play relates to the movement of Jimenez. But at this level you must adapt, you must evolve your play. No Raul means adjust to your new forward. What he likes to do, where he likes to move. Feed them. But often just nah. But Traore exhausts me and I haven’t got anything to say about him any more.

In the past seasons of course the message of Fosun and Nuno were translated into football language. We could see what Nuno meant watching player A or B or getting a result at some ground. The players were the lubricant that allowed those ideas flow to us in the stands. There was no better way to speak to us than through the medium of football. Here we want to see fight, pride, effort all the fucking keywords. Now we get Blah, Duh, Pfft on the pitch and nobody loves us. FosunWolves, the team, the media department. Fosun stand on the shoulders of giants at our club and those giants stood on the shoulders of us, the scum of the earth. The people who stood outside the Civic center when our club nearly went out of business. The people who fought hard for our clubs continued existence. FosunWolves only stand where they are because of us. I watch West Hams third goal go in and I watch our players. Sad faces, Of course they care. There may be a video about it on Social media later. Couple of talking heads, scratching chins, rubbing their scalp. Here in Wolvesland we punch toilet doors, shout at the sky, go to the top of the garden and just sit down looking at the grass. The team, uninterested. FosunWolves continue to tap the cells on the spreadsheets, us…we wait.

Why do we wait? Because we are patient. We remember. The club was never ours to begin with, it’s always ‘theirs’ because they own it but what do they own? Commodities and cash flow, merchandise receipts, transfer profits, charts for growth, plans. All good wholesome abstract things that mean little to us. But what do we own? Ecstasy, grief, worry, love, and hate. What did the derby against West Brom mean to our players? Nothing. What did the defeat against Villa mean to FosunWolves? Adjust prospective cash influx. What did these results mean to me and you? Weeks of fucking pain because we work with these shit heads who support other clubs. We have to put up with the grief now while you laugh and joke at Compton. Pull. Your. Fucking. Fingers. Out. We are Wolves not Puppies. How many times did we see West Ham players powering in front of our players while they ran unimpeded towards Patricio? Disgraceful. Wolves? Fucking puppies more like. Get a foot in, take a card, grow some balls for fucks sake. Ideas are great but actions are better. Make your football greater than theirs, fuck ideas get some studs in the odd ankle. Let them know they are at Molineux. Let them know that they are playing Wolves and not some second division Portuguese team.

A great shout is everybody lashing Nuno about how Mir, Vitinha, all the other loanees doing great shapes at their loan clubs. Nobody has actually said maybe they don’t like playing for Wolves and would prefer to shine on a stage that isn’t Molineux. The questions I want to ask are exactly that, why didn’t your form here reflect what an obviously great footballer you are? Are you taking the piss out of us? Jonny mashing his knee up was a heart ache, I love Jonny but where is the dude that slots in? Takes over? Where is the quality in depth? Four years now lads and we still shoe horn the make shift defence into the match…is it their fault? Can we throw our angry missives at them? Not sure as when you do that then you start picking on one player and the whole experiment to ascertain some element of blame becomes snarky and hormonal.

With me flogging some nostalgic art over the last few weeks I have wallowed in the past because the future seems very shit. We are stuck with rich owners with all the charisma of a plastic bag stuck in a tree and the communication skills of a fucking paving slab, a group of players that are dysfunctional, talented but as tough as the skin on rice pudding. A stadium we cant visit. Pubs we cant go in. But I tell you what kids. I’ve met loads of fellow Wolves fans over the last month. I have been absolutely bowled over at what we are and how we are. We are absolutely fucking brilliant, mental, funny, generous and always fucking proud of Wolves because Wolves really is us. Me and you. The dickheads and the fruit loops, the Psychos and the hooligans, the gamers, ravers, punks, Rastas, the flakies, the Moms and Dads herding about 8 kids through the crowds to get into the stadium. By Christ you are a fucking treasure and it’s you that are Wolves, not them. They may wear the shirt but the shirt will never belong to them it will always belong to us. They may own the stadium but it will never ever be theirs. You win a match and for a few minutes we may allow you to share our joy but you will never be Wolves unless you bleed and suffer like we have. Then, if FosunWolves and the team drag themselves to the foot of any of the stands and show us the blood and the anger then…maybe you will be a Wolf.

This season is a load of dickhole and should be cast from our minds. If there is any lesson to be learned here it’s that when everything seems fine and dandy some fucking bastard will be along shortly to spoil it. That is why we are concerned and afraid. The One pack mentality isn’t dead, I mean it’s been on it’s last legs a few times in the past and still we turn up in numbers, still we sing our hearts out. Wolves in the future should be about us not them. One Pack isn’t a watchword for inclusion, not here. We include everybody who wants to go Wolvesing we don’t give a shit. Turn up, sing, go mad support your team but you know it’s time for FosunWolves and the team to give us something back. Games are running out and the points haul is shrinking. Already people are doing maths with results and I’m thinking about reading the league tables in the back of the Express and Star like we used to…three points maybe then we are there, point at so and so, then we will deffo lose that by three goals, so the difference is….on and on and on. Don’t let it be like that please. If there was Kwan it has deserted us. We are estranged from the team and from FosunWolves. From Nuno? Never. His choices are his to live and die by and such is the burden of Leadership. We just support really, this Coach this entity we know nothing about. We support and we reach out a hand to him and say there will be a break in the clouds and some point and we would like you to be there when we feel the sun on our collective faces again but now is the time for action not ideas, now is the time to give blood not soundbites. Speak to us Nuno, please.