How Wolves helped Elliott Bennett forge a long and fine career

Ask Elliott Bennett the reason for the success and longevity of a football career that came to a fitting conclusion on 600 appearances earlier this year, and the reply is unequivocal.

“For me, the biggest thing which stood out throughout my career, was to be the best version of me, every single day.

“To have a decent career you need a bit of talent, a lot of luck, the right timing but most importantly a lot of hard work.

“I have never been everyone’s cup of tea as a footballer, and my highlights reel would never be one which people would click on and think it was amazing.

“From a young age, I grasped what I was good at, what my best attributes were, and what I wasn’t so good at.

“Often now, whether you’re a footballer, or in another sport, or at school or a job, people always tell you to work on your weaknesses.

“I would do that a little bit, but I also think it’s so important not to get too caught up in what you are not good at.

“Not everyone can be super skilful, not everyone can be super-fast, the game requires 11 different players with different attributes to make it work as a team.

“I would recognise that I needed to be the best at what I was good at – whatever your special attribute is, try to be the best at it, and that should be enough to get you into a team.

“My Dad would always tell me that the only person staring at me when I got home at the end of the day was myself.

“Everyone has good games and bad games, but the one thing you can always control is how much effort you put into it, whether that’s a match or training.

“It was all about whether I had done enough, whether I could have done more, and being able to look back without any regrets.”

Such wise words. And there, in a nutshell, lie the foundations of the Elliott Bennett journey through football.

Granted there was much more involved, a greater amount of talent and technical ability that he would modestly attest to, a calmness under pressure, capacity to make more good decisions than bad ones, an excellence from set pieces.

But ultimately, a relentless attitude and ceaseless determination meant that even though he would have been happy with just making the two senior appearances enjoyed with Wolves after nearly a decade at the club’s Academy, he would go on and make 598 more.

Go on and win promotions, be named in a PFA Team of the Year, play – and score – in the Premier League, captain former Premier League winners, and finish it all off, in truly fitting fashion, at Shrewsbury Town, in the town of his birth.

In amongst that, not only is Bennett hugely appreciative of the footballing grounding he received during his many years coming through the ranks at Wolves, but also the two years spent at Saturday’s opponents Brighton which, having taken the initially difficult decision to move to the South Coast, ended up catapulting his career to greater heights.

So, where did it all start?

In his hometown of Telford, with Hadley Juniors, where he was spotted by former Wolves Academy scout Les Green playing in a five-a-side tournament at the ‘Telford Ski Slope’.

“He was everywhere,” Green recalls. “Collecting the ball when it went out, taking corners, always wanting to be in possession.”

Green, his scouting colleague Bob Bennett, and former Head of Academy recruitment Tony Lacey formed a legendary triumvirate who made a powerful impact on the young Bennett during his formative years. And not just Elliott, but also his younger brother Kyle, who also emerged at Wolves before going off to enjoy a successful career, particularly at Doncaster and Portsmouth.

“I massively respect those guys, and it is only because of people like them that I was able to enjoy the career that I did,” the elder Bennett brother reflects.

“They saw something in me as a boy but have continued to guide and support me all the way through, even long after I had moved on from Wolves.”

The players too, Academy scholars together, have stayed in touch, and those from Bennett’s time have always been particularly close.

He is still in regular contact with Matty Bailey, amongst others, and recently linked up again with Liam Hughes, who, as outlined recently in this feature in the Express & Star, turned to Bennett for support after coming through some hugely challenging times.

And all of them together had to cope with the tragic loss of popular team-mate Lee Collins, who committed suicide in March of 2021.

“Life took us all in different directions, some went on to play professionally and others didn’t, but we shared so many incredible experiences,” Bennett explains.

“We probably don’t see each other as much as we would like to, but everyone has different responsibilities especially with families, and adult life in general.

“When we do meet up, it’s great, and we can chat and joke about the old times.

“Obviously the tragic loss of Lee hit us all, and Liam did reach out to me a while back just for some chats, and I think that shows, even though we’re not kids anymore, there are bonds between us that have stood the test of time.

“And I know full well, in the future if I ever needed any of those guys, they would give me the time of day to have a chat and help me out as well.”

One of the many highlights from the Academy years was when Wolves Under-12s won the equivalent of the junior World Cup in Japan in 2001, the Shizuoka World Junior Tournament, the final played on the same pitch on which Ronaldinho lobbed David Seaman when Brazil beat England in the World Cup a year later.

Bennett captained the Wolves team, and was also named Player of the Tournament.

“We weren’t able to go abroad as a family back then, and so trips with Wolves gave me some great experiences,” Bennett says.

“As an 11-year-old kid, to be on the other side of the world and see and learn about another culture, it was an amazing time.

“Whether we were to go on to become professional or not, those were such big moments for young and impressionable people and it is something that none of us involved will ever forget.”

What Bennett also will never forget are those two senior appearances in a Wolves shirt, as an 18-year-old, against Bradford and Morecambe in the Carling Cup, both at Molineux.

There is not an ounce of bitterness or disappointment that there wasn’t more, just a sheer sense of delight and pride that he got the two and more a positive reflection on his overall Wolves education, which, along particularly with a successful loan spell with Bury, paved the way to go and make his name in League One with Brighton.

“I get asked this question a lot and my answer is always the same – if those two games for Wolves turned it to be all I had in my career I would still have been happy,

“That was always beyond my wildest dreams.

“I was never the best in my age group, I did alright, but I wasn’t the best or the one people spoke about.

“A lot of the time I was my little brother’s brother, because Kyle had so much ability and was so good.

“But to get those two appearances, in front of my family, including my Dad who is no longer with us, that was the pinnacle of where I ever thought I could get to.

“If I knew then what I know now, and I’m talking about the hindsight you have as an adult when you have been through the trials and tribulations of football, then I wouldn’t have been so overawed by it all.

“Young players now have big dreams to play in the Premier League, but I didn’t have those dreams because I didn’t think it was possible.

“My dream was to play one game of professional football, once I got one then I had to set out to do what I aimed for as a little kid.

“Had I had more belief in myself, then who knows? But at the same time, deep down, I knew that I wasn’t ready.

“I went off and had a really good loan spell with Bury in League Two, but that was the season Wolves got promoted to the Premier League.

“So, by the time I came back, it was always going to be even more difficult to break in.”

Bennett remains indebted to the guidance of advice of then Wolves boss Mick McCarthy and assistant Terry Connor, both of whom stayed in touch with him long after he had departed Molineux.

McCarthy even called him five years later to hold his hands up and suggest he had been too hasty in letting him go – a call Bennett was touched to receive – while it was Connor’s influence which helped produce the leap of faith which was to ignite the midfielder’s career.

In his second season at Brighton, Bennett made 53 appearances and scored eight goals as the Seagulls won the League One title, and secured a place in the PFA’s divisional team of the year as a result.

“When Brighton’s interest came in, I really didn’t want to go,” he admits.

“I lived in Telford, travelling to Wolves had always been really close, and my girlfriend, now my wife, was also in Telford at the time.

“But I am so glad that I did.

“I got to live in different places and not live at home where Mum did everything for me, and it was the making not just of myself but of me and my wife as a couple.

“I will always remember a chat with Terry Connor before I went, when I said I didn’t want to go.

“He told me I needed to go, I needed to go to become Elliott Bennett the footballer and not just Elliott Bennett the academy kid from Wolves, to go and make my career.

“Thankfully that’s how it worked out, and when you look at the decisions I made in my career, that was the best one.

“Moving to Norwich - which I did next - wasn’t really a decision because going from League One to the Premier League, that’s not a decision, it was a massive moment in my life.

“But to go to Brighton when I didn’t want to, and a very different Brighton to how the club is now with training at the University and playing our games at a running track, that decision was everything.”

So it was that two happy and successful years with Brighton led to a move to the Canaries, boss Paul Lambert handing Bennett a crack at the Premier League.

He would go on to make 59 appearances and score two goals, the first an incredibly memorable one from distance to clinch a 2-1 win away at Tottenham - Kyle Walker, Luke Modric, Gareth Bale, Jermaine Defoe et al!

“Another special moment,” Bennett recalls.

“When I was playing in Leagues One and Two, those were the players I was watching on Match of the Day, then all of a sudden I was on the programme myself, scoring the winner at White Hart Lane.”

Post-Norwich, which had included loan spells back at Brighton and with Bristol City, there was another hugely enjoyable five-and-a-half years and almost 200 appearances with Blackburn, during which his leadership qualities were marked by being named club captain by Tony Mowbray.

And yet, still to come, was the most perfect of long goodbyes. With Shrewsbury, not far from the hospital where he was born, as an initial one year stay turned into two, and then into three, before being rounded off, with his 600th career first team appearance, against Leyton Orient at the end of last season.

Around 50 of Bennett’s family and friends were present on an emotional afternoon in Shropshire, rounding off an incredible career which he could only have dreamed of when first being spotted by Messrs Green, Lacey and Bennett all those years earlier.

And, in August, he announced his retirement.

“It was the right time,” he confirms, a couple of months on.

“Those three years at Shrewsbury made it such a fitting way to end, being able to come back home, do the school run for my kids, and just be a bit more of a Dad.

“Hitting 600 appearances when I did probably helped the decision, but while I still love football and would have played forever if I could, there comes a time when you have to reinvent yourself to a degree.

“I never wanted to be that player who people looked at and said, ‘his legs have gone, he should be finished’ – I never wanted to be a burden to anyone or go somewhere and get injured after a few games and be stuck on the sidelines.

“I wanted to go out on my own terms, and what better way to finish than at Shrewsbury, the way it happened just felt really fitting.”

So, what now? Family time is paramount, which is why, even though Bennett has had some decent offers from high-ranking non-league sides, he would prefer to keep a bit of flexibility around life and weekends, and not commit to anything too concrete.

He has launched a building business with his wife and friends, with two houses in Telford the first project, helps Kyle with the ‘23 Academy’, the elite coaching academy he runs in Telford, and is close to agreeing details about becoming a mentor to young Academy players at a league club.

There has also been a poignant return to the game, and might yet be one or two more, for Shifnal Town, where he played alongside Kyle for the first time in their recent FA Cup qualifying fixtures with giant-killers Hednesford Town.

Poignant because their Dad Paul, who passed away through cancer three years ago, had previously played for Shifnal during his own extensive sporting career.

Mum Tracey, an incredible and steadfast support to both Bennett boys as they made their way in football, and the world, was proudly watching on.

The first leg finished goalless, Bennett hitting the crossbar from distance late on, before Hednesford triumphed in the replay to set up a tie with National League Gateshead from which they have emerged to reach the First Round proper.

“Dad had played at Shifnal and Kyle loves playing there so they asked me if I would get involved,” he explains.

“The Chairman was actually the manager when my Dad played, so it was a really nice moment to have three Bennett’s having turned out for Shifnal.

“I had played against Kyle a few times, but not in the same team as him, so it was a special moment for us all, and my Mum was there to watch!”

Life does tend to come full circle, and so it has too with Bennett’s son, who is already training at Wolves Academy as part of the pre-Academy programme for players under the age of eight.

The facilities and support structure in place now are massively different to that which Bennett experienced when he came through the ranks all those years ago.

He marvels at the development and progress which has been made and yet, at the same time, Wolves as it was in his era never did him any harm.

Just as he and Kyle learned so much from the information and guidance delivered by their coaches and parents, now the torch can be passed on, and there can be few better examples to follow.

“I will forever be grateful to Wolves as a football club for giving me the platform to go and become a footballer,” Bennett acknowledges.

“As a result, I ended up living something that I never ever thought was possible.”