By Alex Fisher at Molineux
22 May 2011 19:58:00
EPL: Mick McCarthy, Wolverhampton v Blackburn
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The Wolves fans invaded the pitch at the final whistle and they were dancing in the streets around Molineux after their side secured Premier League football with a second half comeback against Blackburn, but Mick McCarthy was trying to stay calm after their final day great escape.
Trailing 3-0, Wolves fans booed their side off at half time but they roared them on in the second half and inspired a crucial second goal which helped lift them out of the bottom three.
Wolves were in the drop zone twice during the 90 minutes but jumped to safety with Stephen Hunt’s goal in the 87th minute and Roman Pavlyuchenko’s late strike for Tottenham against Birmingham sealed their place in next season’s Premier League whilst relegating the Blues.
And Mick McCarthy spoke of his relief after their great escape in a dramatic final day of the league season.
“It was never in doubt, piece of pi**,” he said to reporters jokingly.
“I’m thrilled, proud, knackered, emotionally been through the wringer.
“Of course I’ve got to stay professional, I’m not going to come in here dancing up and down with my drawers in the air, but I guess I feel like doing that as well.”
Hunt’s dramatic late goal lifted them out of the bottom three after twists and turns in three other games around the country, and McCarthy admitted he was still unsure exactly what had happened.
“I don’t really know the outcome of what’s happened, I just know we’re in Premier League, and that was my job to do,” he added.
“I said I was sick of permutations but knew they would matter.”
“We knew we were in it, we were out of it, we were staying up, we were going down. But good old Hunty came up with a goal and we’ve relied on results elsewhere.
“If we were all realistic I thought Tottenham and Manchester United would win. I did feel Wigan had best chance because of Stoke’s FA Cup exploits and they’re in good form.”
At half time things did not look too rosy for Wolves though after going three goals down to a rampant Blackburn side, the fans booed the players off and McCarthy revealed that the morale in the dressing room was low and he had to lift their spirits to inspire the two second half goals.
“You’d be surprised,” he continued.
“It wasn’t a load of expletives and in people’s faces because they were down on their knees. It was more a case of encouraging them, we’d been bashed.
“We didn’t deal with long ball well, in fact we didn’t do anything good at all in the first half.
“I told them ‘We’re going down the plug hole here and unless we play better we’ll go down.’ And as ever, they responded and we got a really good second half performance.”
McCarthy made a half time substitution to introduce more attacking options with Sylvan Ebanks-Blake coming on for Michael Mancienne, and although they created much more going forward they were still grateful to goalkeeper Wayne Hennessey who made a crucial save from Roberts.
“I’ve been downstairs and straight away one of my pals said to me, ‘what a good save Hennessey made’, I know but we can go through all the season about what may have been,” he said philosophically.
“I don’t give a flying, it’s done. We were playing Russian roulette, but we needed goals and that’s why I put Sylvan on.”
With so many twists and turns in the game everyone in the ground was scrambling for information on the other games but McCarthy relied on his staff to keep him up-to-date with events elsewhere.
“I was watching that game and people just kept giving me pieces of paper saying ‘we’re up’, ‘we’re down’, ‘happy days’, ‘b******s’,” he revealed.
“We just needed to score and the last five we didn’t want to concede. I think we can be forgiven for keeping the ball.”
Despite losing it is a positive end to the season for Wolves who live to fight another day in the Premier League, something the fans will go out and celebrate tonight but McCarthy explained he was not sure of his plans just yet, “I might stay sober so I can enjoy it and enjoy what it feels like, then again I might not!”