Golden days that keep bringing Per to Wolves from Denmark

But more than 60 years ago it was in Denmark, and one nine-year-old boy in particular, that was captivated by the club who had just won back-to-back First Division titles.

“It’s a special story,” explained 74-year-old Per Dyrholm when asked how his love affair with Wolves came about.

“In the late 1950s when I went to school most of the boys I played football with supported Manchester United,” he said. “At the time not many people had a television, but every weekend Danish radio would broadcast the results of the English games.”

Dyrholm added: “After a short time, I heard the name ‘Wolverhampton’, and for a nine-year-old boy that was such a great name.”

It was a golden era for Wolves under Stan Cullis, with consecutive league wins followed up with a 3-0 triumph over Blackburn Rovers in the 1960 FA Cup final.

Cullis’ side was packed with talent, and despite not being able to watch his team play the young Danish Wolves fan still found a way to follow his side.

“I found a magazine in a store in Denmark, I think it was Goal, and there was a photo of Peter Broadbent who was such a star for me at that time,” Dyrholm said. “I’d heard his name in the English national team together with Ron Flowers.”

He added: “They also played in colours not many teams were playing in, most were red and white or blue and white, but Wolves were different.

“I also found books in the library on FA Cup winners, and I saw that Wolves had won it in 1949 which is the year I was born – that was very special.”

Dyrholm went the first 11 years of his Wolves-supporting life without ever seeing them play, only laying eyes on his heroes take the field for the first time at the age of twenty.

“In 1969 the Scandinavian countries began to have a Match Of The Day, the first match I saw was Wolves beating Sunderland 1-0 with a goal from Hugh Curran,” he explained. “From that day on there were many Scandinavian people who followed Wolves, but I’d followed them for over a decade by that point.”

Using his love of English football as inspiration, Dyrholm took a job on the sports desk at Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten.

He travelled to England in 1978 on a ‘footballing trip’ with a friend but hopes of watching his beloved Wolves play were dashed when their game with local rivals Albion was postponed due to a frozen pitch.

Despite missing the chance to see a game it still turned out to be a memorable trip for Dyrholm.

“I thought ‘I’ve never been there so I’ll try to see the stadium’, so I took a train to Wolverhampton and there were some people on a tour of the ground,” Per recalled. “When I told them I was from Denmark they said, ‘you must see the stadium together with us’ and that was great.”

He added: “Then they said I could meet one of the players, and it turned out to be Kenny Hibbitt which was out of this world for me because I had named my son Kenneth after him five years before.”

It would be two more years before Dyrholm managed to finally see Wolves play live, but he admits it was worth the wait. “The first game I saw Wolves play was in 1980 but that was at Wembley,” Dyrholm explained. “I came with my son, and it was both of our first games when we beat Nottingham Forest 1-0 in the League Cup final.”

He continued: “We were standing down at the rail as near to the pitch as we could, and when Andy Gray scored the goal he was very close to where we were.

“When I got home I had the match on video, and we could see ourselves when Andy Gray ran to the stand to celebrate.”

There have been some memorable moments in his other trips to England too, not least last December’s last-minute win at Goodison Park in Julen Lopetegui’s first game at the club.

Dyrholm was also there at Anfield in 2017 when goals from Richard Stearman and Andi Weimann knocked Liverpool out of the FA Cup.

But perhaps the most special memory for the 74-year-old is the home game against Queens Park Rangers in 2009, when Sylvan Ebanks-Blake’s goal secured Wolves’ promotion to the Premier League.

“That was very special, it was a gift from my son for my 60th birthday and he had ordered the tickets two months before,” Dyrholm said. “We were very lucky that that was the game when we won promotion, it was only because there was a match that had been postponed a few days before the QPR game.”

He added: “I remember the people running on to the pitch after the final whistle, it’s definitely the most memorable game I’ve seen at Molineux.”

Despite seeing Wolves at the peak of their powers for the first 30 years of his life, his resolve was tested during the dark days of the late 1980s.

But he remained loyal to the club and can even boast a remarkable fact from his time following Wolves in the lower leagues.

“In the 80s when we were relegated from the first division to the fourth division it was not so exciting to be at Molineux with four or five thousand people against teams like Hartlepool,” he said. “One thing I can say is I’ve seen Wolves play Swansea in all four divisions.”

The Dyrholm family will be travelling to Wolverhampton for this weekend’s home game against Newcastle, including his son Kenneth who now lives in Arizona.

And while opportunities to watch the club that he has supported for nearly seven decades are less regular than he would like, the 74-year-old, who does not even follow Danish football, would not change a thing.

“When I wrote an article about Wolves for my old newspaper I finished it with ‘Players and managers come and go, but it’s the name and the colours of the club that remains and that is what we support,” he explained.

“Players can join new teams, but supporters can’t, it is the soul of the club that we follow.”