Coady’s cracker rewrites Wolves’ international history
CONOR Coady racked up two records when playing his second full international for England, against Wales on 8 October 2020.
He became the first Wolves player to score for England for over thirty years and the first to take the captain’s armband in over forty years.
The goal was the first by a Wolves player for England since Steve Bull spared their blushes in a World Cup warm-up match against Tunisia on 2
June 1990.
Bull was capped 13 times by England, and scored 4 goals, all coming in the build-up to Italia 90. He scored his first goal on debut against Scotland on 27 May 1989, and then two against the Czech Republic on 25 April 1990, one a spectacular right-footed volley from a Paul Gascoigne pass.
He was called up to Bobby Robson’s final 22 for Italia 90 on 21 May. After Bull had tasted
defeat for the first time in an England shirt in a 16-minute substitute’s appearance in a 2-1 loss to Uruguay the next day it was then time to fly to the England training camp in Sardinia, stopping en route in Tunisia.
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In the dying seconds of the match England were heading towards an embarrassing 1-0 defeat when Gascoigne fed Barnes on the left. His cross was met by substitute Bull with a stooping near-post header that he felt staked his claim to a meaningful role in his country’s World Cup campaign: “If the manager picks me, I will score. It’s a great feeling. If they tell me to get out there with ten minutes to go, I will give it all I’ve got.”
Next stop was the red hot training camp in Sardinia and Bull scored
twice in a 6-0 win over Cagliari and twice more against a Sardinian Select XI. However, with the exception of a start against Egypt in the group stages he was left to largely warm the bench.
As Steve Gordos recorded in a recent Bugle article, Conor became the fourth post-world War II England captain to come from the club, following Billy Wright, Ron Flowers and Emlyn Hughes. Coady of course had already captained England at Under-17 level, notably at the 2010 UEFA European Championship, a tournament that they won. Peter Taylor then named him captain of the Under-20 national team for the 2013 FIFA Under20 World Cup.
When Coady appeared in the Nations League game against Iceland on 8 September he became the first Wolves player to start a game since Steve Bull
against Poland on 17 October 1990 and the first to feature at all since Matt Jarvis’s substitute appearance against Ghana on 29 March 2011. In his second game, against Wales a month later, Coady captained the side for the final 32 minutes.
This was the first time a Wanderers played had enjoyed this honour since Emlyn Hughes, who led England against Northern Ireland, again at Wembley Stadium, on 20 May 1980. This was the 61st of Hughes’ 62 full caps.
Value
Few can deny the likeable Scouser his days in the sun and we can only hope that manager Gareth Southgate will continue to see his value both on the field and in the dressing room and not succumb to the pressure of selecting from the so-called ‘big’ clubs.