The Story of the Wolves
IN 1921 Wolves had appeared in their fifth FA Cup final, losing out to Tottenham Hotspur by one goal to nil.
Unfortunately, the following season they fell 3-0 to Preston North End in the first round and did not progress beyond the third round until 1927. The 192122 campaign was a pretty miserable one too as Wolves finished just four points clear of the Division 2 relegation zone.
On 25th June 1922 manager Jack Addenbrooke was declared unfit for work and sadly would never return to his post, dying on 7th September.
It brought to an end an association with the club that stretched back almost forty years.
Jack had joined as a player in 1883 but never made a first-team appearance. However, two years later he was appointed Wolves’ first-ever paid secretary/manager, leading them to two FA Cup wins and three appearances as runners-up.
In 1909 Addenbrooke was awarded a long-service medal by the Football League, and his 37 years spell as manager is likely to remain the longest ever in club history. Albert Hoskins came in as secretary with George Jobey becoming manager. The pair will be pictured in Part 28 (Cartoon 53).
Although several new players were added to the squad the first league season without Jack Addenbrooke was a miserable one as Wolves finished rock bottom (22nd, not 17th as the cartoon states) of the Second Division table. They lost 24 of their
42 games, averaging a goal a game, conceding 77 (suffering 7-1, 7-0 and 6-1 reverses) and garnering only 27 points, 9 short of safety.
Gloom
They dropped into the recently formed Third Division (Northern Section) and the gloom surrounding Molineux was
typified by the crowds of just below and just above 4,000 that were attracted to their last two games.
Indeed the attendance of 3,882 for the 3-0 home win over Hull City on the 23rd April was the lowest since February 1915. It would remain an all-time low until September 17th 1985 when only 3,244 saw Bristol Rovers win 4-3 at Molineux, again
in the Third Division.
During a horror season that led to Wolves’ only two seasons in Division 4, 23 home league matches attracted no crowds above 9,000, and 13 attendances of 3,000 and 3 (for the visits of Rotherham, Plymouth and Bury) of 2,000 – hopefully an all-time low that will never be ‘bettered’.
Despite the relegation and a loss of £3,885, that same year (1923) at the annual meeting of shareholders Major Holloway announced the winding up of the old company and the formation of Wolverhampton Wanderers Football Club (1923) Limited. The fight was now on for the team to climb back up the leagues from its lowly position in the third tier.