March 24th, 2010 by Adam Davies

Many predicted they would go straight back where they came from, but newly promoted Wolverhampton Wanderers look set to cement their place in the Barclays Premier League after a brilliant 3-1 win away to West Ham last night. There are just seven or eight games left for all the teams left in the division and Wolves have accumulated a respectable 31 points. The traditional target of forty points for Premier League survival looks an overestimate this year, and with Portsmouth almost certainly down due to their well-documented disaster season, and Wolves seven points clear of Burnley and Hull in the bottom three league places, it would take a cataclysmic loss of form for them to get sucked into the relegation battle.

Like their previous season in the Championship when their away record was the best in the division, it is Wolves’ form in enemy territory which has been most impressive. Their record on their travels is identical in terms of results to Liverpool’s, and it is ahead of many sides above them in the table, such as Everton, Fulham, Stoke, Blackburn and Sunderland. Mick McCarthy has built his side with firm foundations with Marcus Hahnemann a huge presence in goal, Jody Craddock and Christoph Berra offering discipline to the defence, and Kevin Doyle chasing down lost causes up front. Both Craddock and Doyle have chipped in with their fair share of goals too, which has confounded pundits who thought they were mere Championship level.

The one place Wolves can make a vast improvement is in attack, as they have scored the least goals in the division. Before last night’s game, the Premier League’s leading marksman Wayne Rooney had scored more goals than the entire Wolverhampton Wanderers squad, and their current average of less than a goal a game means they are over-reliant on shutting out opposition rather than putting them under pressure – as their two smash-and-grab 1-0 victories over Tottenham demonstrate.

Mick McCarthy was very publicly criticised for changing all ten outfield players for Wolves’ trip to Old Trafford in December, but he vindicated his decision by defeating Burnley convincingly in Wolves’ next league game. West Ham manager Gianfranco Zola had a similar scenario in mind when he rested first choice strikeforce Alessandro Diamanti and Carlton Cole for Manchester United’s visit to Upton Park, but the side capitulated upon the pair’s restoration to the lineup against Wolves. Zola is now coming under increased pressure from both fans and owners of the club, and given that McCarthy has had a far more limited budget to the Italian, Wolves’ achievements so far are all the more impressive.

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