The Express & Star and Sportingbet.com teamed up to give Wolves fans the chance to quiz Mick McCarthy at Compton. Here are a selection, put to him by Tim Nash

Q) Being a Premier League manager is a stressful job. What do you do to relax? (John Needwood, Tipton)

A) I try not to let it affect me as much as I can. I play golf, I cycle and I keep fit, and spend time with the family of course. I don’t do those things to help me stay stress-free because you still end up thinking of the job while you’re cycling and talking to people about it when I’m playing golf, so there’s never a complete getaway. But they help.

So I go to games and I watch other people suffer!

Q) You’re 50, but with Sir Alex Ferguson still going strong as he approaches his 68th birthday, have you set a date to call it a day or do you plan to keep going as long as you can? (Brian Baxter, Cannock)

A) I wondered, when I first started out, how long I’d carry on, but I never thought of when I’d finish. But it can be set for you, can’t it!

I haven’t set a date. I just continue doing what I’m doing, I love doing it and really enjoy it. As long as that continues, I won’t stop.

Even after what happened at Sunderland, I just went away, had a break and I was desperate to get back into it then. If I get to 60 and I’m still loving it, would I walk away? Would I heck. I just keep doing it.

Q) Since your playing days, football has changed in many ways. Can you name three things that have improved the sport and three that have had a negative effect since you were playing? (Roger Bennett, Brierley Hill)

A) Stopping backpasses to the goalkeeper was an improvement but also a negative because the players get no break and they have to work harder.

Foreign players and coaches coming into the game have improved it.

It’s made us more open-minded about things and made us think more about the game.

Sky has been good for the game in increasing the exposure and therefore boosting interest.

On the down side, there’s too much cynicism – we see too much diving and feigning of injury.

I hate seeing great big centre-halves who get nudged going down as if they’ve been pole-axed.

Another negative is that the rules that have gone mad – in rugby, you see people covered in blood grappling and growling, whereas in our game, a player has to leave the field if he has a speck of blood on his shirt.

Finally, a lot of the physicality has gone out of the game.

You hardly ever see a sliding tackle nowadays which was always part of the game.

Q) What is your biggest regret? (Craig Parker, Finchfield)

A) I’ve had disappointments, but no regrets.

I’d have loved to have got through the quarter-finals of the World Cup with Ireland in 1990 instead of losing out on penalties.

I suppose I’d have played the full three years at Lyon, but due to injuries and not playing and wanting to come back and play in the World Cup, I only played 10 games for them.

It was the right decision in the end, because I was captain at the World Cup and I could see opportunities in coaching and management opening up, but I just felt bad that I didn’t do it and play 70-80 games for them because everywhere else in my career I’d seen it through.

Q) Does Wolves’ history help or hinder what you are trying to do at Molineux? (Howard Marshall, Whitmore Reans)

A) It can be both. It helps because everyone knows it’s a big club.

People – prospective signings – want to turn up and play here because they know it’s a great club.

I know that myself because it’s Wolves, it’s the name and the history. Despite all the negatives that surround it, it’s still a great club. So it works in trying to sign players, but it’s still the club that beat Honved, so there are big expectations.

But when all’s said and done, I would still prefer to be at a big club because I want to manage a club with a history.

Q) Who is the best player you have signed and who is the best player you have missed out on? (David Silk, Featherstone)

A) How can you look beyond Michael Kightly or Sylvan Ebanks-Blake?

There’s a clutch of players in the current squad at the moment that have equalled anyone else I’ve signed and it’s got to be good for the club. Sylvan has scored almost 40 goals in less than a season-and-a-half and you only have to look where ‘Kights’ came from to see what a bargain he’s been.

And look at Karl Henry – he turned up with his boots for a pre-season friendly and has been a model of consistency ever since.

I can’t look beyond those.

Of those I’ve missed out on, it would have to be Darren Bent when I was Sunderland manager.

I tried to sign him but it never came off. He was as good as anyone I’ve missed.

Q) If money was no object, who would you sign to complement your current Wolves team and why? (Neville Tonks, Coseley)

A) It would have to be someone to replace what we’ve got, so you’re looking at someone like Wayne Rooney.

But for me, I’d want to sign someone like Ryan Giggs. Steven Gerrard and all of them fall into the same category, but to have held a spot down at Manchester United for that long, he stands out for me as one of the best players over the last 20 years.

And to be so humble about all the success he’s had to marks him out for me.

Q) Have you seen Alistair McGowan’s impression of you? Were you offended of flattered and who does the best impression of you? (Jack Tisdale, Codsall)

A) I first heard it when I was in Japan and South Korea for the World Cup. I walked into a room and heard my voice coming out of the TV screen.

I said ‘I never said that!’ But it was brilliant. I’m very flattered actually – whoever would have thought that a lad from Barnsley could be taken off like that on TV?

McGowan is the best I’ve heard taking me off, but my son does one of me and I’m sure one or two of the players do as well, but it’s all part of the game.

Q) Given the goals conceded from set-pieces recently, why don’t you have players on each post when you defend corners? (Simon Marsh, Wombourne)

A) We have tried bringing everyone back to defend, but it’s a very objective thing and we’ve considered all the options, believe me.

We have to get players in the box, but the first rule of defending is to win the first header.

In the three years I’ve been here, I can’t remember us once heading one off the line.

Q. Why haven’t you signed any proven Premier League players? (Dennis Rogers, Bilston)

A) First of all, I’m delighted with the players we have signed.

We have tried to sign proven Premier League players, but it’s just difficult. Proven Premier League players generally have a choice of clubs.

It’s not a question of me saying, ‘come to us’. It’s not as easy as that, and it’s not always financial.

Q) As an Ireland player born in England, what emotional attachment do you have to the England team and will you cheer them on at the World Cup? (Paul Foster, Sedgley)

A) I don’t have any emotional attachment to England, because having played against them, I wanted to batter and beat them.

I think I ended up with one win, one defeat, which we lost 3-1 – Gary Lineker’s debut – and two draws.

My dad is Irish and from the age of four, I was half and half, English and Irish.

But I would want England to win the World Cup. If England played Ireland, I’d want Ireland to win, and if Ireland get to the World Cup, I’ll be supporting them, but we haven’t got there yet.

Sportingbet.com are giving fans the opportunity to meet Mick McCarthy in person for a chat, an hour before the Villa game on October 24.

Fans will also receive a guided tour of Molineux, a four-course meal and VIP tickets in the Billy Wright Stand, where they will help choose the man of the match before meeting the player. Go to www.sportingbet.com/wolves to enter.