HOWLING AT THE DOOM

With the Sky Sports Monday Night Football cameras rolling at Molineux, Wolves fans seized the additional publicity surrounding their latest inevitable loss to stage a protest against their club’s ownership. When the match against Manchester United kicked off, they massed on the concourse, a sea of old gold and black leaving the stands conspicuously empty for the opening 10 minutes. In a moment of seemingly cosmic irony – or perhaps a cruel act of counter-defiance – referee Michael Salisbury didn’t blow his final whistle until the clock had ticked over into the 10th minute of added time. By then, the game was long over as a contest and Wolves had succumbed to another defeat, a depressing staple of their season. Fans who stayed home and watched the broadcast will have seen the affable James Maddison tell David Jones and Jamie Carragher about enjoying “the little wins” (fathering twins, getting back on the grass and growing a ducktail mullet) during his recovery from serious knee-knack. They must have been wondering if they will ever get to see Wolves register a win again.

In so far as there were any minor positives to be taken from a 4-1 home defeat in which they were seriously flattered by the scoreline, Wolves did at least manage to score a goal for the first time in more than 600 minutes of league football, while the crowd’s former favourite, Matheus Cunha, drew a clearly frustrating blank despite peppering Sam Johnstone’s goal. Otherwise it was business as usual for a team that have taken just two points from their opening 15 matches and in conceding Monday night’s slapstick opener, performed a passable imitation of 11 drunks who had been press-ganged from a nearby pub after a day on the sauce and sent out in full Wolves kit, despite never having seen anyone play football before. “I understand the frustration,” blathered manager Rob Edwards, after his players were booed off by fans who had stuck the defeat out until the bitter end. “I won’t tell fans what to do. I’d love them to support the players but they have to see effort and commitment in return. Mistakes were punished and that filtered through. There was an anger in the stadium. The lads are trying. The supporters are angry and I get it.”

While there is no shortage of justified anger from fans paying a minimum of £735 for season tickets at Molineux to watch their team achieve a historically dreadful run of results, the majority of it is being directed at the Fosun ownership group and its chief suit, Jeff Shi. Wolves’ myriad on-field shortcomings can be attributed to a gradual erosion in squad quality that has occurred on the watch of owners who repeatedly sell star players without buying adequate replacements, and then plough through head coaches when results inevitably don’t go their way. “It’s the toughest league in the world and we came into a team who hadn’t won since April,” sniffed Edwards. “I wasn’t anticipating a quick turnaround.” With powers of perception like that, Edwards’ decision to abandon Boro for this particular bin fire looks more baffling with each passing game.

LIVE ON BIG WEBSITE

Join Rob Smyth at 8pm for red-hot updates on Inter 3-3 Liverpool, while Niall McVeigh has the rest of the night’s men’s Bigger Cup action covered in his clockwatch at the same time. And if that’s not enough 8pm action for you, Sarah Rendell will be all over Arsenal 3-0 FC Twente in women’s Bigger Cup.

 QUOTE OF THE DAY

“Why are female commentators getting abuse more than anyone else? How can we report it? And how do we get convictions? Something that is tangible and makes people sit up and realise they can’t come on here and hurl abuse because they feel like it. Gone are the times when you say don’t listen to them, turn the other cheek. Just ignore them. No. Why should the girls ignore abuse? We’ve had it for years where we’d just ignore it. Who are we to say ignore it? We should be helping them report it, to make them feel OK in that space” – Emile Heskey talks to Sam Cunningham about stepping up to tackle abuse in football, his desire to protect his sons and Liverpool’s woes.

Emile Heskey at home, earlier. Photograph: Christopher Thomond/The Guardian

Please! No mo’ of the low Slot-Salah show from Peter Oh (yesterday’s Football Daily letters). All his alliteration gave me a pain in the assonance. We all know, though, it’s about the dough” – Justin Kavanagh.

Surprised how negative the English commentary is about Salah. Do I really have to listen to journos and old players rant on and on about team loyalty? Last year turned out to be the final year of Kloppball, not the first year of Slotball. If a manager can’t figure out how to get along with Salah, nor get his very expensive signings to perform in a way that justifies his mistreatment of the Egyptian, he’s not up to it” – Richard McGahey.

After all the much-deserved plaudits he’s received in recent weeks, a final doff of the cap to Martin O’Neill. He rejoined Celtic after they’d just lost to Hearts, by far the best team in the Scottish Premiership (I know, I know), and then signed off with a win, promptly before they had to play against, and inevitably lose to, Hearts again. As O’Neill clearly knows, the secret to great management, like comedy, is timing” – Noble Francis.

Back in those heady days when Trevor Francis and Chris Waddle graced Sheffield Wednesday with their presence, I was working for the club’s official sponsor (the amounts involved would make everyone laugh today). This gave me access – I’m not saying I’m proud about it – to tickets for the FA Cup semi-final between Wednesday and Sheffield United played at the grand old Wembley stadium. On the big day, we all forgot that both teams had fans working for the company until the Unitedites mixed among us jumped in the air to celebrate the first goal! Fighting was avoided, and the game ended better for Wednesday (perhaps Noble Francis was also there?), although we lost to Arsenal in both cup finals that year (and didn’t get into Europe!). Anyway, I was reminded about the experience a couple of days ago when my eldest son, Santander born and bred, went to watch Racing play away at Cádiz and could only get a ticket to sit with the home fans. With a certain amount of luck and perhaps even some help from the ref, Racing scored in the 93rd minute to win 3-2. And yet after the game, as my son and his friends walked back to their lodgings in their green, white and black scarves, no less than five Cádiz fans approached to CONGRATULATE THEM on the win!” – Matthew Kipwell.

Send letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. Today’s prizeless letter o’ the day winner is … Noble Francis. Terms and conditions for our competitions, when we run them, can be viewed here.

Need a Christmas gift for that special football-obsessed person in your life? Well the Big Website Bookshop has loads of great reads available. You can even just treat yourself. Get shopping here!

Christmas is coming. Illustration: Guardian BookshopRECOMMENDED LOOKING

It’s David Squires on … Mohamed Salah’s explosive interview and chaos at Liverpool.

Tick, tick, tick, tick … boom! Illustration: David Squires/The GuardianNEWS, BITS AND BOBS

Celtic chairman Peter Lawwell has paid tribute to John “Dixie” Deans, who has died aged 79. “Dixie was a great Celt and one of the finest goalscorers ever to have played for the club,” he said. “I was fortunate enough to have watched him play throughout his career and he played his part in the successes we enjoyed in the 1970s, not least in those unforgettable hat-tricks he scored against Hibs in two cup finals at Hampden.”

England winger Jessica Naz will miss the rest of the season after sustaining the second ACL injury of her career.

A court has jailed 20 suspects, including Super Lig players, pending trial in a betting investigation that Turkish football’s chief suit said may widen. “For years, the problems of Turkish football have been swept under the carpet,” roared Ibrahim Haciosmanoglu. “Such disgraceful decisions have been made, such crimes covered up, and the sole responsibility for our current situation is a lack of will.”

Wrexham’s movie bro owners, Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney, have sold a stake in the club to the USA USA USA-based private equity investors Apollo, less than three months after the Red Dragons received a cool £14m in state aid.

Cole Palmer has not travelled with Chelsea to Atalanta as he continues to be managed after suffering toe-knack with some clumsy footwork at home.

Fans of sixth-tier Macclesfield are getting their tinfoil FA Cup ready after drawing holders Crystal Palace at home in the third round. View the full list of fixtures here.

Macclesfield players get their celebrations on after scoring in the second-round win at Slough. Photograph: Nigel French/PA

Under-pressure Xabi Alonso reckons Manchester City’s visit to the Bernabéu is the perfect way for Madrid to bounce back after their bobbins home defeat by Celta Vigo. “We’re all in this together,” barked Alonso. “United! Convinced that this is an opportunity!! We need to have the energy to connect with the Bernabéu!!!”

And it’s nearly Christmas so, of course, someone has been left home alone.

THE ROAD TO WEMBLEY

Beloved of Geopolitics World Cup crooner Robbie Williams and darts godfather Phil Taylor, Port Vale are now Football Daily’s adopted team in the FA Cup. Having beaten Bristol Rovers courtesy of a goal by Ben Waine on Saturday at Vale Park, the Cup is providing respite – a “wonderful distraction” in the words of manager Darren Moore – for a team currently rock bottom of League One. The boys from Burslem will hope to repeat the magic of 1988 when the Valiants, in the fourth round, downed mighty Tottenham – Chris Waddle, Gary Mabbutt, Clive Allen et al – courtesy of goals from Ray Walker and Phil Sproson. The opponents they pulled in the third round tombola are Fleetwood, the Cod Army mid-table in League Two. Both clubs will seek progress with the hope of meeting one of the giants in the fourth round.

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The Guardian has kicked off a new chapter in puzzles with the launch of its first daily football game, On the ball. It is now live in the app for both iOS and Android … so what are you waiting for? Get stuck in! 

STILL WANT MORE? 

Yara El-Shaboury recalls William Gallas, Roy Keane and Ronaldo letting fly as she charts some of the game’s most explosive outbursts.

Fighting talk: Raheem Sterling, Roy Keane and William Gallas. Composite: Guardian Picture Desk

Jonathan Wilson sees no winners in Mohamed Salah’s war footing with Liverpool.

These are troubling times for Liam Rosenior’s Strasbourg, who have a Chelsea-bound captain suspended for “failing to respect the values, expectations, and rules of the club”, writes Raphaël Jucobin.

And in the latest edition of Moving the Goalposts, Temwa Chawinga talks exclusively about coping without her sibling and grabbing everything on the NWSL table.

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MEMORY LANE

 5 May 1965: It’s the Big Cup semi-final and Roger Hunt, now second in Liverpool’s all-time list of goalscorers, ahead of Mohamed Salah but behind Ian Rush, fires one past Inter. Liverpool won the home leg 3-1, only to lose the return 3-0 in Milan. The latter defeat has gone down in infamy for some questionable refereeing, including the ruling out of what would have been a crucial goal. “I just remember running through and putting the ball in,” sighed Ian St John. “I don’t know what the infringement was supposed to have been.” Offside was given, a decision that rankles still over 60 years on.

Photograph: Central Press/Getty ImagesOTD 25 YEARS AGO: KING SCORES AFTER 10 SECONDS!