Jones: I got booed off at half-time and carried off at full-time

Dave Jones believed Wolves were never out of contention, despite finding themselves 3-0 behind at half-time, when they faced Leicester City in a 2003/04 Premier League clash.

Speaking on the third instalment of Old Gold Club: Big Match Revisited, the former boss admits he felt Wolves needed just one goal to swing the momentum back in his side’s favour, and knew that once they began to reduce the deficit would go on to win the contest.

Jones joins Mikey Burrows and Chris Iwelumo from 8pm this evening to relive the memorable fightback, along with several of his squad who played a key part in that season.

Supporters can catch the latest episode of Big Match Revisited on Wolves’ official YouTube channel, with the likes of Alex Rae, Kenny Miller, Lee Naylor and Jody Craddock also joining Jones in looking back at a game which will live long in the memory.

On a crazy game at Molineux

“It was just an unbelievable game to be involved in. I got booed off at half-time and carried off at full-time!

“I always remember Mikey Adams at full-time and he had the same look that I had at half-time – what the hell has gone on?!

“I had a drink with him afterwards and we said the best way to describe it was that it was like we changed places, we changed suits because I know what he was feeling at full-time because I had that at half-time.”

On coming in 3-0 down at half-time

“It was a strange game because I didn’t believe we deserved to be 3-0 down, and my annoyance was more that every goal seemed to be the same type of goal we were conceding.

“From what I can remember, and I’m quite good at remembering goals and games, every goal they scored came from corners and it was almost like déjà vu each time.

“Two came from the left and one from the right and I couldn’t believe it, because at 3-0 it didn’t look like that sort of game.

“I just couldn’t wait to get them in at half-time and just quietly talk to them.”

On his half-time team talk

“If you’re getting absolutely battered, you know on the day that you’re not as good as what you’re competing against, and sometimes it becomes damage limitations and just trying to keep the score down.

“But we never felt that at half-time, it was just a case of ‘can we get an early goal?’ because you never know. People say that 2-0 is a dangerous scoreline, but if you score early on at 3-0, hope starts to come back.

“When you’ve had those experiences in games, you’ve always got to have a belief and that manager’s spiel that you can get something out of this, and that was what we must have done.

“There was obviously a lot of anger and shouting among the players, but there was a clear message about what we had to go out and do.

“I wasn’t a ranter – although I could rant and rave with the best of them – but you’ve only got three or four minutes to give your information because then players want to wander off, do their own thing and get prepared to go out in the second-half, so whatever we said, we only have a few minutes to do it.

“I would be lying to say I knew what I said because I haven’t got that good a memory, but it would’ve been more instructional about cutting out what we’d been doing and just start to perform like we knew they could do.”

On a stunning second-half comeback

“Once we got the first goal, I think belief came back, the crowd started to get behind us, and the floodgates opened for us like it was for them in the first-half.

“When it gets to 3-2 and then 3-3, I remember turning around to the staff and saying ‘we’re gonna win this’.

“I always did believe that in the game, if we did score first we did have a chance because, from what I can remember, there wasn’t a big deal in it. It was just that every time they had a shot or header on goal, it went in.

“To be booed off at half-time is not a nice feeling, but I certainly was quite happy to be carried off at full-time.”

The third edition of the must-see 90-minute Old Gold Club: Big Match Revisited premieres at 8pm on Monday on Wolves’ YouTube channel, before being available in the archive at tv.wolves.co.uk.

Big Match Revisited will be powered by Blyth Group, an industry-leading construction company driving investment and infrastructure across the UK.

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