Last season, Wolves Women were chasing promotion to the second tier of the Women’s Super League and had a mathematical chance of finishing above leaders Nottingham Forest going into the final day. What the players did not know is that it was futile anyway.
The application for promotion had been due to be filed in February. The club had not sent it in. The demands of a full-time programme had been deemed too much even though they met all the criteria. Even head coach Dan McNamara only found out later.
The players were told in the dressing room after finishing second. For captain Anna Morphet, it is a painful memory. "It was a shock, complete disbelief. A lot of emotions. I remember not knowing what to say so I did not say a lot, I was just trying to digest it."
Soon after, the players went public on social media to express their frustrations. One talked of feeling let down, another of deserving better. There was anger at the lack of transparency as well as the lack of support. It was a wake-up call for the football club.
One year on and with the team once again on the brink of winning promotion, this application has been submitted. Things have changed. Morphet calls the events of a year ago an "incredibly tough moment" but also reflects on it as a galvanising one too.
"Those moments bring you closer together. You look around and realise how special this group is and the characters in it. If we didn't have the closeness that we had before finding out that news I don't know if we would have come through as well as we have."
Morphet felt for McNamara, who delivered the news. "For Macca, who has put in so much work for so many years to have to be the one to tell us - I knew it would not be anyone else, he would never shift responsibility - I cannot imagine how difficult it was."
McNamara is visibly moved when taking himself back to that moment. "It was one of the toughest things I have ever had to say." A serviceman with the Royal Air Force, he called on his military experience to guide him through what was a test of his leadership.
"When I was first told the news. I was emotional. Part of me wanted to tell the girls and let the whole thing blow up and hope they did not turn up for the last few games of the season," he concedes. Instead, he kept the information to himself until after that final game.
"We decided that the girls needed to enjoy the moment together before we brought them back down to earth right away. We did not want to take away that moment they had worked so hard for. If we had done it, it would have been obviously horrendous."
He admits that he never thought he would manage Wolves again. "I just could not walk away from the girls. They said, 'look, shall we give the club a chance? Do we really want to play elsewhere?' The general consensus was that we wanted to stick together."
Would it all unravel, the team disappearing without trace? Or would this be a watershed moment for Wolves Women, a stepping stone to better things? "Thankfully, it has been the latter." One year on, promotion is a game away. And this time the club is ready.
Wolves have won 20 of their 22 games in the FA Women's National League Northern Premier Division. They are the league's top scorers. It is remarkable that it has not been enough for automatic promotion. They were pipped to the title, a point behind Burnley.
"We do feel a little hard done by," says McNamara. But the overriding emotion is pride at the team's response. "They have done unbelievably well. Through disrespect at times, through adversity at times. They represent this football club and this city impeccably."
For Jenny Wilkes, chairperson at Wolves Women, it has been quite the journey. "A rollercoaster," she calls it. A local radio personality, Wilkes became involved in the club in 1999 at the request of Wolves legend and then chief executive John Richards.
She formed a limited company and got sponsors on board with help from former England cricketer Rachel Heyhoe-Flint. Memories of those early days highlight the rise of the women's game and the challenges that have been overcome just to get this far.
"One of the players' dads worked in road working machinery and he used to bring the machinery down to bang down a big divot in the middle of the pitch, until it was sand because that was the sort of pitch that we were playing on in those days," she recalls.
"Players had to pay subs. It was the captain's job to collect the cash on training night. We had to pay for the coach transport." There was a time when even "getting the club to let us buy the kits at cost price" was a battle. This is the context. Things have improved.
"It is a much different place. This is the closest we have been. It has helped the club to see things in a bit of a different light. I am working closely with [technical director] Matt Jackson and we are in a much better place now that we have better communication."
The emotional low of last year could be followed by the highest of highs. Wilkes has seen near misses before - a promotion bid curtailed by a pandemic and a previous play-off loss to Southampton. And, of course, that divisive disappointment of a year ago.
But it feels close again. Promotion to the second tier of the Women's Super League would be transformative. It means going fully professional, for starters. McNamara has a job to do first but he is duty bound to think about what it would mean for all involved.
"If we were to get promoted we have a really, really short time frame to try and completely change the football club," he explains. For many players, this is the dream. "To be able to play a small part in creating their dreams would mean the world to me."
Morphet was one of the first three women players to earn a semi-professional contract with Wolves but she is still working many days a week as a physio. The prospect of potentially having to make other plans is seismic. "We know it can be life-changing."
The knowledge that this time promotion would be for real adds poignancy to those recollections of a year ago.
"When you look at where we're at now, I think it just seems crazy that it happened but thankfully we have come out in a completely different light."
Feeling valued by the club, albeit belatedly, is special. This has been her "home away from home" and after eight years and almost 200 appearances for Wolves, the years of working that other job while still training like a professional could soon be rewarded.
"I knew deep down that I was never going to give myself the best chance to achieve the dream in football - which is full-time - without a few sacrifices. The amount of sacrifice we have all put in, you start to feel like something good must be around the corner."
Wolves Women are at that corner, that crossroads. They take on Plymouth on Monday at the Pirelli Stadium in Burton with a place in WSL 2 on offer for the winner. On the rollercoaster once again, Morphet and the rest surely deserve their moment.
