Four-goal masterclass was too much for the might of Moscow
Part 6 of our look back at the famous floodlit friendlies that lit up Molineux in the 1950s
November 16, 1954, Wolves 4-0 Spartak Moscow Friendly – Attendance: 55,184
SPARTAK Moscow arrived at Wolverhampton with a reputation for being a skilful team that were more than capable of getting a result on their foreign travels.
They had recently beaten Belgium’s Liege 7-0 and Anderlecht 5-2, and the week before the Wolves game had beaten Arsenal 2-1 at Highbury.
The evening’s programme notes introduced the visitors, providing some salient facts about Spartak:
“Team of the Soviet Producers’ Cooperative Movement, Moscow Spartak have been in existence only since 1922, but have won the Soviet League Championship five times and the National Cup on a similar number of occasions.”
A flurry of goals came in the last five minutes, with Wolves dominating the later stages of the game
With the Russian side’s domestic qualities (Spartak finished second to Moscow Dynamo the previous season) and their fine away form in their friendly games, the Molineux game was set for a closely fought contest. Wolves were unbeaten under the Molineux lights and for this game BBC provided radio commentary of the whole game and secondhalf television coverage.
The foresight of the BBC to only broadcast the second-half of the game paid off dividends, with a flurry of goals after the half-time interval. The firsthalf had ended with the two sides evenly matched at 0-0.
The visitors showed the Molineux faithful their skilful link up play and attacking football that saw Bert Wiliams produce some superb saves and at times when he was beaten Bill Shorthouse and Billy Wright came to the rescue, with both making goal-line clearances.
The game remained goalless until the 63rd minute, when insideleft Dennis Wilshaw scored as he scrambled the ball home for Wolves to take the lead, after the Spartak keeper Piraev had failed to punch the ball clear.
The Courier and Advertiser newspaper ran with the headline ‘Wolves riddle Spartak defence’ and this reflected the flurry of goals that came in the last five minutes, where the Wolves players dominated the later stages of the game.
In the space of three minutes the Wolves players scored three goals against the bamboozled Spartak defence. First on 86 minutes was Johnny Hancocks, who got Wolves’ second goal. The outside-right squeezed between the Spartak defenders and dribbled past their keeper, and just a minute later turned provider as he headed the ball to Roy Swinbourne, who powered home a 20-yard shot to see Wolves go 3-0 up.
Dennis Wilshaw completed the late flurry in the 89th minute as he bagged Wolves’ fourth goal of the game.
That completed the night’s scoring as Wolves finished the game in style with an impressive 4-0 victory. In an actionpacked end of the game Johnny Hancocks had had a goal disallowed for off-side, but the Wolves crowd were more than happy with the ones that had been allowed to stand, and seeing another floodlit friendly victory.
Speaking after the game, Wolves manager Stan Cullis told the Daily Herald newspaper: “This is our proudest day. We have done something more than winning the Cup or the League.”
He also spoke of a rematch. “We shall go to Moscow for the return match and we shall be there in good time.”
Indeed the following year did see a rematch of the fixture, with Wolves travelling to Moscow in the August of 1955. It was a game witnessed in front of a crowd of over 80,000, among whom there were 100 Wolves supporters who had made the long trip, including members of the Mander family. Unfortunately, the supporters’ long trip was not to be rewarded with a Wolves victory. It was Spartak who gained revenge for the heavy Molineux defeat the previous year, as they came out victorious, winning by a 3-0 scoreline in front of their home crowd.