Olly surprised everyone with a bizarre looking line up as he went in search of some sort of away form. Royce was in goal behind a back four of Evatt, Shittu, Santos and Milanese. Bignot lined up on the right of midfield with Moore on the left. Bircham and Doherty were paired in the middle with Gallen and Furlong up front.

Rangers got off to an awful start with Wolves hitting the front after eight minutes. Having already denied Rohan Ricketts early in the piece, Royce was forced into another save from the same player. He wasn’t able to gather cleanly though and Rickets managed to pick out Carl Cort via an air shot from Leon Clarke. Cort’s strike was fierce and was past Royce before he had managed to get his hands up.

It seemed a foregone conclusion that Wolves would roll over Rangers but they managed to hit back just four minutes later. Stefan Moore ran into space in the corner before slinging over a first time cross to the far post. Gallen attacked the ball and managed to get up above Lee Naylor to nod past Oakes.

Rangers were starting to see a little more of the ball but failing to do much with it. They were made to pay for their lack of a cutting edge when Carl Cort scored his second of the game. Kenny Miller ran into acres of space behind Ian Evatt and put in a cross that flew between keeper and defenders. Shittu pulled out of his clearance and this seemed to wrong foot Royce and he was helpless to stop Cort slotting home from four yards.

Holloway switched Evatt and Santos over with the latter now at right back, a new one even for Georges! Before the break Rangers had a couple of chances to hit back when Furlong had a shot saved and then an effort from Bignot was blocked before the keeper needed to intervene.

Half time saw another reshuffle as Georges went into midfield and Bignot went to right back. Gallen had also seemed to have dropped deep so we were now playing one up front, away from home whilst a goal down. Answers on a postcard please.

It was all Wolves now and had it not been for Royce we could have been on the end of a cricket score. The defence was trying to play for offside with a line that looked like a dog’s hind leg. Time and again the line failed and twice Royce had to thwart Scotland international Miller.

There was still plenty of time left when Wolves had the ball in the net again, courtesy of Danny Shittu. A ball in from the right once again found the back four all over the place and Shittu slid in to try and clear the danger. Royce was left helpless by the touch and the ball rolled slowly over the line. Wolves were already celebrating when they saw the linesman flagging for offside against Cort. It was a tough decision as under the current rules Cort was not interfering with the play as the ball had not got to him.

In the last minute Wolves did add their third as Carl Cort claimed a hat-trick. Ricketts was again the instigator as he slipped a great ball through the crooked backline. Evatt came haring out for offside, unfortunately for him Bignot, Shittu and Milanese didn’t! Cort had a simple chance of slotting past the exposed Royce to claim the match ball.

From the view on Sky, and whilst trying desperately to cut through the Wolverhampton love in Kamara seemed to be having, we played poorly against a side that will probably wallop a fair few sides this year. The amount of chances Wolves create is incredible and they do move the ball quickly and incisively, much as their manager used to back in the day.

We finally managed to get a goal away from home but it does not disguise the fact that we rarely trouble the keeper on our travels and we do seem to play an extremely negative game. Perhaps it is time for us to try and impose ourselves on teams a bit more before we get overrun and buried before we know it. 

simon@qprnet.com