Legendary Sky Sports Soccer Saturday supremo Jeff Stelling would often read from a very similar script when describing a goal from former Wolves winger Michael Jacobs.
“It’s a goal for Wolves, and it’s come from Michael Jacobs,” he would begin.
“Doubtless it was a cracker.”
And Jacobs loved it.
“I was only talking about this with my Mum the other day,” he reveals.
“I think he carried on doing it most games when I scored.
“It probably helped that I only scored every few games and wasn’t like a striker scoring every week – that could have got a bit tiresome!”
It’s nearly ten years since a couple of Jacobs’ crackers popped up to win a pivotal game for Wolves.
And it prompted an upsurge in something of a rivalry which has developed with Friday’s FA Cup opponents, due more to familiarity than either geography or any particular sense of needle.
That all stems from the time the two clubs were promoted from League One a decade ago, after which the Bees then later followed the Molineux Men from Championship to Premier League.
Looking back further, never the twain had the two met for 38 years between 1947 and the opening day of 1985/86, when Neil Edwards scored on his Wolves debut in a 2-1 defeat at Griffin Park before Dean Edwards notched in the Molineux return when Brentford won 4-1.
That season saw Wolves complete their miserably unstoppable plummet from top division to bottom, but, inspired by Steve Bull, they redressed the balance somewhat in the following years.
And that included against Brentford, with Bull notching six goals in the following five fixtures between the two, of which Wolves won three, including in the Sherpa Van Trophy enroute to Wembley success in 1988.
Since the Bees completed the league double in 2015/16, Wolves have been the more dominant, winning six and drawing two of the most recent nine fixtures.
That sequence has included several memorable away trips, notably two late goals from Matt Doherty and Helder Costa when Wolves really needed three points under Paul Lambert, a Ruben Neves winner under Bruno Lage, and, of course, the club’s biggest ever Premier League away win achieved at the Gtech Community Stadium just last week! You’re only as good as your last (away) game!
But back to Jacobs’ crackers, and rewinding a decade, when there was a particularly lively and memorable encounter – certainly from a Wolves point of view – during that season when both deservedly surged to automatic promotion from League One.
It would later prove to be a very unhappy stomping ground for Kenny Jackett as Wolves were beaten 4-0 and 3-0 on their next two trips to Brentford. Painful.
But on this day, back in February of 2014, things were different. Memorably different.
“It felt like a really big game,” Jacobs, now with Chesterfield, recalled this week. He wasn’t wrong.
Going into it, Brentford topped League One, their haul of 66 points from 30 games putting them two ahead of both Leyton Orient in second and Wolves in third.
The Bees were flying, 19 league games unbeaten, but Wolves were waking from their Gillingham slumber, responding to a disappointing defeat in the first week of January to win five in succession, scoring 12 and conceding just one.
The atmosphere was properly crackling in West London that afternoon amongst the 11,309 packed into Griffin Park.
A tight and tense first half was ended when James Henry flicked Kevin McDonald’s cross into the top left corner of Brentford’s net, and a tight and tense second half reached its finale when Jacobs first ran onto Bakary Sako’s exquisite pass to beat the keeper and then fired home with precision from the edge of the box after good work from Sako and Scott Golbourne on the left.
Throw in some added spice when the Brentford fans were unhappy about the celebrations of the Wolves bench, not to mention the chinos at the station after the game – if you know, you know – and it was certainly one of those awayday afternoons to remember.
“We were going toe-to-toe with Brentford at the top of the division and it was set up for a really good game,” says Jacobs.
“It was such a big game at League One level, especially at that stage of the season against another team aiming to get promoted.
“It was one of those afternoons which was quite cagey, and quite feisty and frantic at times, with a bobbly pitch and it took us a bit of time to settle.
“I barely touched the ball for the first hour or so but then got those two goals which made it a great game to remember.
“It just capped off a brilliant day, to win down there against a promotion rival, it was certainly a really good one to be involved in.”
That Brentford brace remains as one of many standout moments for Jacobs so far in a career which began on home turf, coming through the ranks at Northampton Town.
He made his debut at 17, the first of a century of appearances which included scoring in front of the Kop in a 2-2 Carling Cup draw against Liverpool at Anfield, also converting one of the penalties which saw the Cobblers spring an upset.
Named player of the year in the 2010/11 season, he made the step up to Derby County in the Championship, but he will always have nothing but the best memories of the formative years spent at Sixfields.
“Coming through the youth system at my local club was such a great experience, and probably gave me far more than I even realised at the time,” says Jacobs.
“It’s such a well-run football club with good people – many of whom I still see when I go back – and I had a couple of great seasons in the first team which gave me a strong foundation to take forward.”
Life at Derby, which included a couple of substitute appearances in draws against Wolves during the 2012/13 campaign, was a mixture of starts and arrivals from the bench, the likes of Jamie Ward and Will Hughes proving tough competition on that left hand side of midfield.
And it was in his second season as opportunities became limited, that Jackett came calling.
“The interest from Wolves came as a bit of a surprise,” Jacobs acknowledges.
“I had always been in and around the 18 at Derby, and wouldn’t say I was looking to get out, but I did want to be playing more regularly and Wolves is a massive football club.
“I was moving from the top end of the Championship to League One but when I turned up at the training ground, I remember thinking how much quality there was on show.
“I hadn’t been playing at Derby and was wondering how I was going to play at Wolves!
“It took me a few weeks to get into my stride but it was such a great dressing room, and the rest of that season remains one of my favourite times in football.”
As a player who could slot into either wide position or as a number ten, Jacobs was added to an attacking department already featuring Sako, Henry, and later Nouha Dicko, with the forwardly-mobile Dave Edwards in a midfield including the passing skills of Kevin McDonald. Jack Price and Lee Evans.
“What a group it was,” says Jacobs, whose Wolves debut came in the home game with Brentford in the November of that season, a hard-fought goalless draw.
“James Henry was such a good player who I got on great with, and Sako was well above that level, wasn’t he?
“In that first season I tended to come in off the right hand side and I always knew Dave would make forward runs to make space for me to come and play and with Kev Mac, Evo and Pricey they would find me in areas where I could turn and play people in.
“I think that team had so many players who could produce something out of nothing – particularly Sako and Dicko for example – so, even if we were having an off day, I always thought that something would happen to pull us out.
“Being part of that team and going on to win the title was a special memory, games like Brentford and the win at Swindon and playing at Molineux when the place was absolutely rocking.
“After the previous couple of difficult seasons at Wolves the pressure was on to be promoted and to be a part of that, and getting so many points, was brilliant.
“I’m still in touch with a few of the lads, I speak to Sam Ricketts regularly and caught up with Stears (Richard Stearman) when Chesterfield played Solihull Moors a couple of times last week.
“I played against Doc (Matt Doherty) in the cup when he was at Spurs and also against Dave later on – when you catch up with those guys you realise what a great group it was.
“Everyone just fitted in really well and so while we had plenty of quality, we also had such a strong team spirit on the back of it.”
Initially moving to Molineux on loan, Jacobs’ stay became permanent ten years ago this week, and he scored eight goals in that first half season, including a brace against Notts County the week before repeating the feat at Brentford, also finding the net in the last-day carnival against Carlisle.
The following season, however, didn’t continue on the same upward trajectory.
The arrival of Rajiv van La Parra and later Benik Afobe added to the talented forward options, leaving Jacobs’ game time limited, and he spent part of the final stages of the season on loan at Blackpool.
He did return for a brief appearance at Middlesbrough and, with Wolves narrowly missing out on reaching the play-offs, the climate soon changed as the club hit something of a stalemate and was put up for sale not long after.
“There was a different feel to that second season, more players came in and I probably played maybe one in six games,” Jacobs adds.
“I’m not sure whether it was just difficult to find me a position but I remember even when Sako went to the African Cup of Nations, I didn’t really play much, it was very stop-start.
“Then we got to the end of the season and I had a really good chat with Kenny who said he could see me playing a lot more the following year.
“Then Wigan came in with a decent bid for me, which was more than Wolves had paid, and it was one the club accepted, so it fell into their hands a little bit.
“Again, I never really wanted to leave Wolves, but it was one of those situations that happens, and I went on to play regularly at Wigan which I really enjoyed.
“Wolves was amazing though, such a fantastic club to play for, and I don’t have any regrets.
“I have a son and a daughter now, and one of the people that works at the pre-school my daughter goes to in Northampton even came up and told me they used to go and watch me play for Wolves with their Dad.
“I did go on and play a lot of games in the Championship with Wigan, and it would have been nice to do that at Wolves, but it was a great time for me even if it felt like it was cut short just a little bit.”
At Wigan, Jacobs did play regularly in the second tier, as well as winning a couple more League One titles as the team’s fortunes fluctuated.
Much of that Latics spell was played under former Wolves midfielder Paul Cook, who signed him for Chesterfield last summer, from Portsmouth where Jacobs spent three years after being signed by Jackett back in 2020.
Cook and Jackett are both fondly remembered by Wolves fans for different reasons, and both have very different personalities, but it is their similarities – the honest, straight-talking – which Jacobs has relished.
And that is what persuaded him to drop down into non-league this season for a Chesterfield side flying high in the National League, fresh from a remarkable comeback win against Solihull on New Year’s Day and with a big FA Cup tie of their own at Watford this weekend.
“Both Kenny and Paul have been great with me and have played such a big part in my career,” Jacobs explains.
“They are different managers who are chalk and cheese personality-wise but very much the same in terms of how they are with players.
“I have always liked structure and honesty as a player and like to know what I am walking into, and both of them are quite religious in terms of what they stick to – they don’t change too much.
“I think Paul has played the same sort of formation and style of play since he started and the way he works and what he wants from his players is always the same.
“Similarly with Kenny, he was great with me all the way through and even though it didn’t pan quite pan out in my second year at Wolves, he then took me to Portsmouth for a couple of years.
“I like the honesty and structure that they both provide and that’s why I have spent chunks of my career working for them.
“Paul was a big part of me coming to Chesterfield in the summer, he helps give me confidence and I’ve certainly still got the same passion and enthusiasm to be successful that I always have.
“Fourteen years on from making my debut, I’ve still got the fire in my belly, and still love being part of successful teams that are trying to achieve things.
“Hopefully we can carry on the season we have had so far, and that there will be some more achievements to enjoy in a few months’ time.”
Within that time, he’ll also be hoping to provide a few more Jacobs’ crackers to digest, just as he did at Brentford a decade ago.
