No easy games? Surely this one would be for Arsenal. Never before in English football history had a team endured a worse league record after 15 matches than Wolves. In any of the professional divisions. Their haul of a meagre two points gave an outline of the grimness, although by no means all of the detail.

Before kick-off, the bookmakers had Wolves at 28-1 to win; it was 8-1 for the draw. And you just had to hand it to the club’s 3,000 travelling fans who took up their full ticket allocation. There were no trains back to Wolverhampton after the game, obviously. It was a weekend. Mission impossible? This felt like the definition of it.

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