It is 30 years ago tomorrow since Graham Taylor took charge of his first game as Wolves manager.
Well, that’s half accurate.
Taylor had originally planned to sit in the stands at Bolton’s Burnden Park in an observational capacity and leave the on-field direction to caretaker boss Peter Shirtliff.
But with Wolves 2-1 up, and the game swaying in the balance, he could wait no longer, heading pitchside and taking his place in the dugout.
Shortly afterwards, Guy Whittingham grabbed his second goal of the game in front of a packed and delirious away end, and Taylor’s Wolves were off and running,
That was Taylor all over.
When in work, so completely and utterly immersed in the job, so focused on doing whatever was needed to help his team, whether via meticulous preparation, or during the 90 minutes.
It’s fair to say not every Wolves fan was fully behind the decision to hand Taylor his first job – and a high profile one at that – since what had turned out to be an ill-fated spell as England manager.
But it’s also fair to say his commitment and dedication, and – as ever – the wearing of heart on sleeve, won the vast majority of them over. And if opposition fans tried to take the mickey? Wolves fans have always thrived on that type of siege mentality. And always will.
Had it not been for a cruel glut of injuries to key players, and some rotten lock and rotten refereeing in the play-off semi-finals 14 months after Taylor’s arrival, it could have been a match made in heaven.
Ultimately it didn’t turn out like that. But more on Wolves later.
Ahead of Saturday’s visit to Aston Villa, where a promotion and then top-flight second placed finish, built on his success at Lincoln and Watford, secured Taylor that England opportunity, time for a look back on the man who was so delighted to take the Molineux helm those three decades ago.
John Ward, who would later coach at Wolves for several years as well as temporarily holding the fort as caretaker manager, was a trusted assistant to Taylor during hugely successful spells at Watford and Villa.
The two first met when Ward, a striker, signed for Lincoln, and found himself positioned in the dressing room next to Taylor, Imps full back and captain. An ultimately career-defining moment.
“I was 18 or 19, going into my first day at a professional club, and I was nervous,” Ward recalls.
“When I got there, they said, ‘there you go, that’s your peg’, and I was next to Graham, the captain.
“As I look back now, it was one of the biggest and best things that happened to me in my whole career.
“As soon as I met Graham, he made me feel welcome and settled – ‘come on Wardy let’s get on with it,’ he said – and from then on, I was ‘Wardy’.
“I could sit and talk to him about anything, and I learned so much.
“It was later that I went to play for him at Watford, pretty much as cover as they had some brilliant strikers, that I then moved into coaching.
“I went around to his house and he must have gone through so much analysis over four or five hours – knowing him as I did from there, I am surprised it wasn’t even longer!
“It was a new side to him, I had never seen anything like it, and that was just the start of a really positive working relationship.”
Another who maintained such a positive alliance with Taylor across several different clubs – including Wolves – was winger Tony Daley.
The flying winger had already made his breakthrough with Aston Villa when Taylor checked in as manager, and had already worked for his new boss during an England Under-20 tournament in Brazil.
Daley was young, ambitious, a hugely exciting prospect who was already exhilarating fans up and down the country with his electric pace and blistering wingplay.
Enter Taylor, and the sort of man management which only true and almost innate footballing instinct can provide.
“I was 19 when Graham arrived at Villa, effectively going into my second full season, and because I’d done well for him on an England Under-20s trip which he had led, I was delighted when he arrived,” Daley explains.
“At Villa, we were going through a transitional phase at the time, there were a lot of older players there and a drinking culture and we’d just been relegated with barely a whimper.
“Graham’s remit was to inject some discipline back into the club, and at the very first meeting with the players, he told us how it was going to be, that he would be speaking individually to some who would be leaving, and anyone else who wanted to go, could knock on his door.
“He brought in new rules, a lot of stuff like no jeans and no tracksuits, and his first pre-season, in terms of the fitness work, was absolutely horrific!
“For me at that time, I’d been on an upward trajectory since I was maybe 15, with people talking about me as a ‘wonder boy’ and wondering what I was going to achieve – I hadn’t experienced any negativity.
“And then, for the first few days of training, Graham didn’t even speak to me.
“Even in training, if I did something well, he didn’t say a word, and on maybe the third day he walked past me in the corridor and I looked to try and attract his attention and he walked straight on by!
“Maybe on the fourth or fifth day – on one of his notorious three sessions-a-day during pre-season, he was talking out on the pitch about his tactical approach and what he was expecting and most of us, myself included, were not paying proper attention.
“All of a sudden, it was like the players parted and he was addressing me, with all the other lads looking on.
“’As for you,’ he said. ‘You are supposed to be this golden child and this fantastic player and part of the new generation, and I’ve not seen a single thing to suggest that’.
“He told me if I didn’t buck my ideas up, I’d be down the road – and that meant Blues by the way – and I honestly thought that was me done at Villa.
“I even remember speaking to my agent thinking I may have to leave.
“Then the following day, Graham took me to one side, and did some one-to-one work with me for an hour, which was repeated pretty much every day for the rest of pre-season.
“That was the turning point – he confirmed to me years later that he was looking for a response, for me to say, ‘I’ll show you’, and from that moment on I felt invincible every time I went onto the pitch.”
With Daley having excelled under Taylor at Villa, earned all his seven England caps during his time as Three Lions manager, and been signed by him at both Wolves and Watford, there is little wonder that the unforgiving footballing dressing room cranked into gear.
“Everyone used to say he was like my Dad,” he laughs.
“I still remember Bully (Steve Bull) and Thommo (Andy Thompson) particularly enjoying that on the first day I arrived at Wolves!”
But there were so many players, particularly in the Wolves and Villa days, who remain so grateful to Taylor for his guidance and counsel.
Rob Edwards, now Luton manager, was given both his Villa debut and a new contract by Taylor, but will never forget the time he and others were taken to task because their house was a mess!
Steve Froggatt, another who labelled Taylor as ‘like a father figure’, turned down Premier League clubs to be reunited with his mentor and drop down a division to join Wolves.
Don Goodman, another of Taylor’s Molineux signings, was handed his training kit on the day of his £1.4million move from Sunderland, and told he would need to take it home and wash it himself.
“He had an aura about him and was one of those managers you would run through a brick wall for,” adds Goodman.
For all Taylor’s successes at club level, the second place finish in his first spell with Villa, the extraordinary ascent of Watford from Fourth to First Division and an FA Cup Final, runners-up spot and Europe, not to mention another promotion to the top-flight second time around, the elephant in the room remains England.
A poor performance at the 1992 European Championships, and failure to qualify for the 1994 World Cup, when poor refereeing again playing its part on an infamous night in Rotterdam, included a fearsome campaign of vilification in the national tabloid media, at its height labelling Taylor as a ‘turnip’ following defeat to Sweden.
“As a player, coach or manager, when you get stick from the fans or the media and you deserve it, there is no issue,” says Daley.
“That’s part of the game.
“But when it becomes personal, that’s completely different, and that affected Graham, for sure.
“I will tell you now, the sort of treatment he got at that time would have ruined many a person but for him to come out the other side, and enjoy more success, is testament to who he was.”
But amid that personal vendetta from certain sections of the national media, speak to those from the profession who covered Taylor’s teams, particularly from Watford and the Midlands, and all you hear is tales of his generosity of time and spirit.
His father Tom had been the Chief Football Writer at the Scunthorpe Evening Telegraph, and so Taylor junior knew the importance of, and tried to nurture, positive working relationships with the football media.
As well as the supporters.
Up to his time at Wolves, so taking in his first spells at Watford and Villa, he ensured he replied to all letters personally, following the mantra that ‘they are writing to me, not my PA’.
On one occasion, he even invited a particularly vociferous critic to come and impart her knowledge directly to the Wolves squad at training. She called in sick on the day.
All who requested interviews were trusted and given a chance, including Wolves fanzine editor Charles Ross, with whom he maintained email contact even after moving on. “A terrific human being,” Ross recalls.
And when tasks like programme notes – which he had previously handwritten – were taken on by media departments, he would still ensure it was always his words that were included, as recalled memorably by Paul Brown, who was working at Villa during Taylor’s spell and is now doing a similar job at Manchester City.
Not long after starting at Villa, on one occasion Brown was called into action to look after the manager’s notes as more experienced colleague Rob Bishop had been called away.
Villa weren’t having a great time, and Taylor was under pressure, but the nervous Brown needn’t have worried as his wait in reception was broken by the cheery greeting of: ‘Great to meet you young man and welcome to Aston Villa.’
Before chatting for half an hour, Taylor also told Brown he was just as important to the club as first team strikers Juan Pablo Angel and Dion Dublin, before the junior reporter disappeared to compile the 600 words which were then despatched, with some trepidation, back to the manager’s office.
Word came back that the notes were ‘perfect’, and a few days later Taylor walked past Brown and Bishop ahead of his pre-match press conference.
“’Ah, it’s One Take Brown,’” he said, patting him on the shoulder.
“’Hey Bish, this lad is good, you can learn a thing or two from him’,” before he winked and headed off into the distance.
There are countless other stories which could be used to sum up Taylor, and to somehow condense them into one feature is pretty much ‘An Impossible Job’, the title of the TV documentary which, in certain quarters threw another dose of ridicule towards the former England boss, but, in others, showed just how much he cared.
And maybe the best man to speak to is – Taylor’s best man, Alan Morgan. The two became close friends after first meeting at Henderson Avenue Junior School in Scunthorpe at the age of seven or eight.
Theirs was a friendship which endured throughout Taylor’s life, including plenty of good-natured-competitiveness and camaraderie, much of it forged on the sports field.
Morgan remembers Taylor as an ‘outstanding schoolboy player’, skills honed as the pair played football on any grass patch they could find – jumpers for goalposts etc – and then together for both school team and at county level.
And such was their respective competitive streaks that Morgan still treasures a press cutting from the school sports day for the 80 and 150 metre sprints that reads: 1 A. Morgan, 2 G Taylor, 3. A. Jacklin. Yes, that was future golf superstar Tony Jacklin trailing home in third!
“Graham was always a fun-loving chap and we would always pull each other’s legs,” Morgan recalls.
“He was very competitive throughout his life and his leadership skills were always in evidence.
“He was head boy at our junior school and would have been the same at Scunthorpe Grammar School if he hadn’t gone off and signed for Grimsby Town instead of going into Upper Sixth.
“The headteacher gave him a proper telling off saying that grammar school people didn’t go into football, but I think it worked out o-k in the end!”
It certainly did, and Morgan’s friendship and specific local knowledge was to work to the short-term benefit of Taylor, and long-term advantage of Wolves, when he arrived as boss 30 years ago.
Much of Morgan’s working life was spent as a key figure within leisure services across Wolverhampton, particularly when heading up Compton Park Activities Centre, and he would also later teach at St Peter’s School just next door.
Taylor was not just focused on the first team from the moment he checked in at Wolves, he was also able to convince Sir Jack Hayward that the club needed its own training ground, and that was an ambition to which he devoted plenty of his own spare time to try and fulfil.
Morgan would drive his pal around to assess different venues including Aldersley Stadium, Old Wulfrunians, RAF Cosford and Lucas Aerospace, as well as Compton Park.
“Although his home wasn’t far away, Graham spent the first few weeks staying at the Mount Hotel, declining my offer of hospitality,” he explains.
“But he just wanted space to focus completely on sorting Wolves out.
“During that time, I drove him around to have a look at a lot of different places, then we’d finish up at the Mount with a plate of sandwiches, discussing all the pros and cons.
“I probably saw him more during those few weeks than I had done for the previous ten years!
“I had a lot of experience of leisure facilities in Wolverhampton and I knew Compton Park like the back of my hand, and eventually that was what they settled on.
“Graham actually got me in to work for Wolves at that time, co-ordinating their mini-soccer, and we actually won a national award which I collected on the club’s behalf from Jimmy Hill.
“It was great to have him close to home and working for Wolves, but sadly it didn’t last – I would regularly joke with him that I lasted longer at the club than he did!
“I was proud to be his best man and he was a great friend to myself and my wife Sue, and I still phone his wife Rita up every year on January 12th, the day he passed away.
“Graham always had high standards of discipline but he was firm but fair and never wavered in that – and he was always good fun as well.”
In so many ways Taylor was ahead of his time.
During discussions around the new training ground in the mid 1990s, he championed the need for female changing rooms, predicting the growth of the women’s game.
He was one of the first managers to bring in a sports psychiatrist, and Daley vividly remembers, at a time when poor mental health was viewed as a weakness, Taylor’s door always being open and being ready to listen, and put support in place for any players who were struggling.
And Ward, who would later become a successful manager in his own right, recalls learning so much from Taylor’s ability to get the very most out of his players.
“He had a lot of decisions to make but he handled them very well and with personality – he was always very concerned about players as people as well in how he treated them.”
On the pitch, for Wolves at least, it didn’t quite come off.
Taylor’s only full season in charge ended with that infamous play-off semi-final against Bolton when Peter Shilton’s heroics kept the scoreline down in the first leg, and John McGinlay’s brace having somehow escaped with a yellow card for punching David Kelly with the aggregate scores level, clinched the second.
Wolves struggled to respond at the start of the following season, winning just four of their first 16 league games, the last of which, a goalless draw against Charlton, included the agony of Goodman’s stoppage time header bouncing to safety off the crossbar.
By now, a number of Wolves fans were vocally calling for Taylor’s removal, but Goodman was one of the many among players, supporters and staff who feel his exit came far too soon.
That was a theory which ultimately proved correct, as he went off to Watford and helped them get into the Premier League whilst Wolves, for another eight years, continued to fall agonisingly short.
His legacy – the training ground and the improvement in Wolves’ youth policy – remains as a reminder of the plans put in place during his 18-month reign, and the esteem in which he was held was there for all to see when Wolves met Villa just a couple of days after his passing at the age of 72 back in 2017.
The initial optimism which greeted that first win at Bolton sadly didn’t herald a golden return to the game – a meeting with the same opponents just over a year later put paid to that.
But after his resignation, in typical Taylor fashion delivered in person to the media, he gathered Wolves office staff together for a glass of wine to thank them for their support and try and raise their mood amid their sadness at his departure.
Dignified to the end. A dignity so fondly remembered.
