Search: ' Jack Hayward'

Wolves' promotion to the top flight is going to cost them. Jim Heath explains how

Wolverhampton Wanderers’ return to top-flight English football has come at a cost. In addition to the well publicised investment club owner Sir Jack Hayward has made over the last decade, he is now having to make pay­ments to Swindon Town, Charlton Athletic, Sunderland and Coventry City – adding up to the tidy sum of around £1.5 million. Not bad for a now depressed market. This all stems from add-on clauses to the original fees Wolves paid for players, which would only be activated if and when promotion was finally achieved. So, Shaun Newton suddenly be­comes a million-pound player overnight – his original £850,000 fee from when Wolves bought him from Charlton in August 2001 has just in­creased by some £300,000. Similar increments are due to the others for George Ndah, Alex Rae, Paul But­ler and Cédric Rous­sel. Which is fair enough, as during the season they have all made a big contribution to the overall objective of promotion. Except, that is, Cédric Roussel.

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Wednesday 1 Villa and Newcastle are both through to their respective “finals” in the Intertoto. John Gregory seems underwhelmed by his side’s away goals win over Rennes: “If we’ve got to play in the competition then qualifying for the UEFA Cup is what it’s all about.” Barry Town beat Porto 3-1 in the second leg of their Champions League tie. The Football League deny reports that Celtic and Rangers may be invited into this season’s Worthington Cup, although League chairman Keith Harris hopes to see them included next year: “They would help spice up the competition for our sponsors and improve its appeal to the television audience.” Celtic’s 4-3 win at Old Trafford in Ryan Giggs’s testimonial is enlivened by several near-fights, most featuring David Beckham. Dutch goalkeeper Edwin van der Sar is the subject of the first-ever transfer deal between Fulham and Juventus, moving for £7 million. Portsmouth sign 1998 World Cup star Robert Prosinecki from Dinamo Zagreb.

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Dear WSC
In WSC 157 there appeared an advertisement for a new book about Reading FC entitled Rusting Tin & Shiny Plastic. I feel obliged to point out that, although tin can certainly corrode, the only metal that actually rusts is iron. Clearly the “football cultural revolution” in Berkshire has failed to bring a knowledge of basic chemistry to the area. Tsk.
Eddie Edwards, via email

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Dear WSC
Just a pedantic correction to Matthew Taylor’s piece in WSC 156 about foreigners in Britain throughout the century. Danish international Nils Middleboe did indeed play for Chelsea from 1913, but not just for one season. He made 46 appearances for the club between 1913 and 1921, a period encompassing five seasons. As an amateur, he reputedly never even claimed his expenses, rather like today’s foreign contingent. Incidentally, and though I’ve got nothing in particular against Germans or Germany myself, I was interested in Uli Hesse-Lichtenberger’s suggestion in the same issue that the Belgians have never forgotten the German invasion of 1914. The similar over-running of their country in 1940 probably didn’t help either and may be fresher in some elderly Belgians’ memories.
Peter Collins, London SW17 

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Jack Hayward spent lots of money preparing Wolves for the Premier League, but as Charles Ross discovers, you need more then just a fancy stadium to get there

If it was a difficult start to this season for Wolves, it was worse for Sir Jack Hayward. After selling Robbie Keane, we exited the Worthington Cup at the hands of the other Wanderers (Wycombe), and lost the second home league game to Walsall. Cue sporadic chants of “sack the board” and “where’s the money gone?” After a decade of Hayward’s involvement, the answer seems to be that the money – around £46 million of it – has gone on a fabulous new Molineux and on players not fit to grace it.

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