‘A change from the gold and black: The story of Wolves’ away kit’ by club historian, Pete Crump
Although gold and black is synonymous with Wolves, throughout the years the club has donned a variety of iconic change strips and as we continue to celebrate our 150th anniversary, we’re taking a look at how the Wolves away kit has changed over the years.
This is part 2 of the series on Wolves’ away kit history. To read part 1, focusing on how the away kit changed in the club’s first 100 years, please click here.
Introducing a sponsor
In 1982, another plain and iconic away shirt was seen with Tatung appearing on the front for the first time. During the 1982/83 season, we saw the plainer version, which was clear and crisp like the 1979 to 1982 shirt, but without the Umbro on the arms and with the addition of the sponsor. This was worn at a few games that season.
This shirt also featured plain white socks. All of the away shirts had included plain white socks since at least the late 1940s. The second white away shirt which displayed Tatung, however, saw a return of hooped socks.
The second Tatung away shirt featured a pinstripe design. Each alternative gap, however, between the pinstripes has a slight grey/silver colour, although the remakes since have been plain white, which is a slight inaccuracy. The second Tatung away shirt of the 1980s also had a striking collar and trim on the sleeves, finished with a gold stripe. This shirt, however, would last from 1983 to 1986 and the sponsor would be removed for 1985/86 until another trip to Blackpool.
On Saturday 5th April 1986, Wolves travelled to Bloomfield Road and played in the white pinstripe; however, that day it had the Benjamin Perry sponsor on the front. This is therefore highly likely to be one of the rarest Wolves shirts of all time – if any of them still exist in this form today. And oh yes, you guessed it, we wore black shorts that day too.
Only two weeks ago here at Wolves Museum, we were kindly loaned three versions of this classic away top by Wolves supporter Carl Easter. There are two with Tatung on the front, worn between 1983 and 1985, and one which is now a plain version.
If you look closely at the plain version, you can see the stitching marks. This shows where the Benjamin Perry patch has been removed. It shows that the shirt was worn in the Blackpool game, so an example of the shirt at Blackpool does exist, but without the patch sewn on.
If there are any more about, or more to be discovered, it is highly likely they won’t have the Benjamin Perry patch on. The shirt in question would have been worn at Newport in December 1985 unsponsored and then at Blackpool sponsored by Benjamin Perry.
At Wolves Museum, we would like to place on record our thanks to Carl Easter for loaning us these three extremely rare shirts. Not only are they excellent and rare pieces, but SUDU have also been influenced by them for the new away shirt.
Going all white
In the late 1980s, we also saw the very well received white away shirt from Spall with the Staw Distribution sponsor. This was most famously worn on Tuesday 28th April 1988 in the rearranged game at Somerton Park versus Newport County. This game saw Wolves clinch the Fourth Division title, and Newport were the team that we most definitely needed to change against.
We explored in our museum newsletter in recent times how Newport County’s colours are inspired directly by Wolves after they had been created by relocated steel workers from the Lysaght steel works in Horseley Fields. Take a look at Newport’s 1988/89 home shirt and it might look very familiar.
There were occasions in the Fourth Division years when Wolves wore the home shirt with the white away shorts. Images show this happening at the famous Chorley away game in the FA Cup first round in November 1986 and at Preston on the then-plastic pitch in February 1987.
This is more evidence that colours were only changed out of necessity, as for example, at Burnden Park against Chorley, we could not wear the white shirt as they wore black and white stripes. We also couldn’t wear the black shorts as they wore black shorts, so were there no change gold shorts initially with the Spall shirt? There were some available by 1987/88, as we wore them at Notts County in the Sherpa Van area final first leg in April 1988.
Another very popular away shirt from the late 1980s/early 1990s was the Manders Paint and Ink shirt. It was produced by Scoreline of West Bromwich, and with the gold and black trim, it looks very similar to the away shirts of the 1950s and 1960s.
Waterloo blue 1990
It was announced in the programmes in 1990 that there would be a new colour for the Wolves away shirt and, as far as we are aware, the first time we had ever worn a colour other than white for the change shirt.
Waterloo blue, which was a sky-blue away shirt, was launched in 1990. This was the first ever away shirt to also carry the Goodyear sponsor. It was, however, only worn on a couple of occasions, those being at Hull City and Oxford United. Like the home shirt, that kit was no longer in service after November 1990, because as we discussed previously with the home kit, there were problems with supply before the season even began because of the issues at Scoreline.
On Saturday 10th November 1990, Wolves wore their new Bukta shirt for the first time against Newcastle at home. The sky-blue away shirt was also reproduced, and again, the shirts looked the same from a distance, but it was merely the back pattern which differed. The Bukta shirts, both home and away, have made a comeback in recent years with excellent reproductions complete with Bukta branding.
A darker shade of blue arrived in 1992/93 and was retained for 1993/94. This shirt was an in-house design and originally accompanied the ‘Tyre Track’ shirt. This again has seen a comeback with another excellent reproduction in recent years.
However, the strip posed a problem on Saturday 24th August 1992. The ref was not happy, we believe, with Oxford United’s dark blue shorts clashing with our blue shorts at the Manor Ground. Wolves therefore borrowed Oxford United’s bright red away shorts.
This was not the first time this had happened. On Tuesday 7th November 1989, Wolves also had to borrow a pair of Sheffield United’s white shorts for our evening game in the Zenith Data Systems Cup at Bramall Lane. One can only assume that we had accidentally packed our black shorts and not our gold, as the next game in the league was Sunderland away and Wolves were in all gold that day. Another example was Wolves wearing, we believe, Derby’s blue away shorts on Saturday 18th October 1975 at the Baseball Ground.
A white away kit returned by popular demand in 1994. It was another shirt that looked very similar to the shirts of the 1950s and this was the away shirt which also displayed the coat of arms – the only shirt of that era to don the coat of arms. The white away shirt was very popular and was used for both 1994/95 and 1995/96 seasons. It was used a few times in our Anglo-Italian Cup journey and iIt was even worn at home against Ascoli in the same competition, similar to that Norwich cup tie in January 1971. Away from home, it was also worn in conjunction with the home socks on Saturday 7th January 1995 as Wolves turned around a two-goal deficit to knock Mansfield Town out of the FA Cup at Field Mill.
Teal, white, hat-tricks and debuts
A new colour was added to the Wolves away palette for 1996/97 – this was the wolf head shirt in all teal. This was worn when Steve Bull scored the hat-trick at Grimsby Town on the opening day of the season and it was also worn at Oxford, Port Vale and Norwich.
Interestingly, it was also still being used in the pre-season games of 1997, as images show Wolves playing in this at Stirling Albion. The pre-season tour of Scotland that summer was the first time that Robbie Keane played for the first-team, although Keane would make his debut just over two weeks later at Norwich City, in a game which saw Wolves also give their new white away shirt with teal trim a run out.
Keane exploded onto the scene, scoring both goals that day in the new away shirt. The shorts and socks were also teal with this popular choice, although the final away shirt of the Puma deal in that era was a more traditional design of all white with gold and black trim, which was worn in 1999/00.
In-house sky-blue and silver
In 2000, Wolves returned to an in-house design for the first time since 1994. We also saw the return of ‘Old Gold’ on the home kit. There were two away shirts in that era. Firstly, the return of all sky-blue which was worn in 2000/01. This shirt was worn at home in Mike Stowell’s testimonial against Aston Villa, and it was also worn on Saturday 16th September 2000 against Wimbledon at Selhurst Park. Joleon Lescott scored his first ever goal for Wolves that day and Sami Al-Jaber made his debut.
The final Goodyear away top came with a new colour, namely silver/grey. Wolves were wearing this strip on Saturday 13th October 2001 and that day Wolves beat Bradford City 3-0 at Valley Parade and Adam Proudlock scored a hat-trick in this shirt. It was also worn at various games including in the play-off semi final first leg at Norwich that season.
We’ll round off the story of our away shirt next week as we focus on how the kit has changed during the last two decades.
Wolves historian Pete Crump’s weekly articles reflecting on a range of topics from the club’s proud past will be available throughout the 150th anniversary season on wolves.co.uk.
