Friday 1 May 2009

Fabulous Foley deserves fans' plaudits

So much has changed at Molineux since Wolves won their last Premier League game, exactly five years ago today.

But one thing remains exactly the same from the team that beat Wayne Rooney's Everton 2-1 to the team that will line-up to receive the Championship trophy on Sunday.

The 2003/4 team had a fantastic right back, and the 2008/9 team has a fantastic right back.
For Denis Irwin read Kevin Foley - and that fact has been wonderfully acknowledged by the Molineux masses.

Even speaking as a fan who voted for Sylvan (with my decision based on his sheer weight of goals), the victory by Foley in the player of the year award sums Mick McCarthy's Molineux ethos up perfectly.

Good teams need stars like Sylvan and Michael Kightly, but promotion-winning teams need stars and unsung heroes.

And the beauty of Foley's accolade is that unsung heroes are massively appreciated, and unsung heroes can become star names.

The 24-year-old former Luton man is a star performer, and it's heartening to see that 51 per cent of 6,000 Wolves season ticket holders wrote his name on their voting slips.

How Foley, the most consistent signing of the McCarthy era, was not worth a place in the PFA Championship team of the year is beyond my comprehension.

He's so cool, so calm, so intelligent on the ball, so solid....so like Irwin, a rare hero of the Premiership season.

Foley admitted to being "gobsmacked" after landing the award, but he had no need to be.

Now he will bring his undoubted defensive talents to the Premier League - and a regular starting berth in the Republic of Ireland team could become a reality over the next 12 months.

McCarthy has made some great signings at Molineux, and much of the spotlight has so rightly been shone on Sylvan and Kightly for their spectacular achievements.

But suggesting Foley could prove to be McCarthy's best-ever Molineux signing is no act of folly - and committing him to a new long-term contract could be a very sensible bit of summer business.

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