Lifelong fan Keith sheds light on Wolves' fluorescent kit

Did Wolves play in luminous shirts in the early days of floodlit games?

Wolves were no doubt wearing their fluorescent kit in their famous match against Spartak Moscow in 1954. Here Spartak goalkeeper Mikhail Yakobovich Piraev watches a shot from Peter Broadbent, far right, sail over the bar.

It is a question we posed to fans in a recent feature highlighting the first floodlit game at the Molineux played on September 30, 1953, at which, wrote our match correspondent at the time, First Division Wolves "wore their luminous strip."

Now, thanks to Keith Garner, we can shed some light on the issue.

And it turns out that for their pioneering floodlit games Wolves did indeed play in a special fluorescent gold shirt which made them look like darting fireflies under the Molineux lights.

However they were unpopular with the players as they had an elasticated band around the middle which caused them to ride up their backs rather than hang down normally.

Keith tells us: "I am a long-term Wolves fan. I wasn't at the game in question. I actually started going to matches with my dad later in that same season.

"I suppose a better description for the special shirts would have been reflective, rather than luminous.

"I don't know what they were made of – some kind of satin perhaps – but they were shiny and reflected the lights a lot better than the normal shirts.

"I suppose in those days mist or fog was rather more common so the shirts would definitely have helped.

"I'm not sure when they started to use normal shirts, but I saw them in the reflective ones in 1954-55. I think they may have become unnecessary when the new, and taller lights were installed. They were certainly a huge upgrade on the original ones."

This 2004 picture from our files shows former Wolves striker Roy Swinbourne being reunited with the fluorescent shirt he wore against Honved in 1954. Seated with him are Peter Broadbent, while watching are other team members, from left, Bill Shorthouse, Ron Flowers, Bert Williams, Les Smith, Bill Slater and Eddie Stuart.

The original 1953 floodlights were upgraded in 1957.

Keith was born in Wolverhampton, but the family moved away when he was very young. He lives now in Newcastle-under-Lyme.

His memories gave us the nudge to delve into our archives, which confirm that Wolves played early floodlit fixtures in fluorescent gold shirts.

Keith added: "The picture you included in your article, showing the increased height of the 1957 lights, triggered something in my mind and I have just realised what it was.

"There was some talk in the late 1950s of rebuilding the ground. The idea was not to do what was eventually done and extend the site, but to build multi-level stands round the ground on more or less the same footprint. I think it even got an airing on Sportsview at the time.

Molineux under snow in February 1953. A proposed big redevelopment in the late 1950s using the same footprint as the old ground never materialised.

"The proposed stands would have been several times higher than the existing ones and to demonstrate how tall they would be, horizontal bars were put across the new floodlight pylons at the appropriate height.

"The proposal never really got off the ground, and, as I can remember the proposed stands looking rather peculiar at the time, perhaps it's as well."