Wolves had the perfect day - match analysis and pictures

The result, the performance, the statement, the impetus for what lies ahead. All of it hard-earned but all well-deserved.

OK, top spot in League One would have completed a nap hand but that was always going to be the subject of fine margins out of their control.

But all they could control at Griffin Park, they did – and that included most especially, Brentford.

The seemingly unstoppable west London club were checked in such conclusive fashion it was difficult to believe at the finish just how testing this fixture had seemed in the days approaching, and at times during, the contest itself.

Here was the proof, then, of what the fans suspected and the players promised. This Wolves team had more gears to go to and the presence of the most formidable opponents League One can muster duly prodded Kenny Jackett's group into finding them.

Individual performances on a beast of a surface moved up a notch, too, ensuring the execution of Jackett's game plan.

Carl Ikeme and his defenders, feeding off the first line of resistance established by Jack Price and Kevin McDonald, claimed another clean sheet. In this run of six successive wins, Sam Baldock's penalty for Bristol City remains the only breach of their lines.

And then came the contribution of the craftsmen up top.

Two more goals for Michael Jacobs, a perfect execution on the counter attack followed by an even better one to finally break Brentford's spirit, suggested once again that Wolves did not so much sign him from Derby as commit an act of grand larceny.

James Henry provided the first with an equally cultured clip, at pace and on the half volley, which spoke of the growing dimensions of this re-constituted squad.

And all of this woven around endless signals of a vibrant, committed and united dressing room. Tackles are made, challenges go in, headers are cleared and always, as the man responsible gets back to his feet, there is a team-mate ready with an appreciative hand-slap or high-five. Little gestures of a big change Wolves so desperately needed.

As a result, this League One campaign, widely greeted as a belittling experience for the club, has become exactly what it needed to be – the footballing equivalent of a week at the health spa, where toxins are cleared from body and soul.

For the supporters, the experience is proving as enjoyable as last season's was bitter.

Wolves have already won 20 games, six more than they managed in the Championship crash and four more than they celebrated in those last two seasons in the Premier League.

The currency may be weaker but they are relishing the spend again – even if "Can we play you every week?" and "We're just too good for you" was a little out of step with the respectful manner in which the club has conducted its affairs in the third tier.

Significant

Of course for this season to claim its ultimate validation it has to finish with the big prize.

But Wolves are in a groove, there's no doubt about that. An eagerly-awaited contest was restricted as a spectacle by the game's most dominant force, a pudding of a surface which both sets of players came to distrust and it was equally a credit to each team that the collision still managed to produce significant moments of quality.

The best of them, happily, came from Wolves and clinched the result.

For 19 previous games, Brentford had been running teams off their feet with a high-energy pressing game and growing goal power – this was the first time they had failed to score since the absorbing goalless draw at Molineux back in November.

They summoned two such passages, either side of the interval, which ran into repeated and impressive rebuttal from an unyielding Wolves. Danny Batth was outstanding, Richard Stearman equally assured; the full-backs Sam Ricketts and Scott Golbourne composed and faultless in decision-making, Golbourne laying claim to a man-of-the-match rating with his handling of the powerful Clayton Donaldson.

And in the thick of Brentford's striving, Wolves claimed the goal that from early on you sensed was within their grasp.

For a worrying few moments at the start, there were fears Bakary Sako was going to allow himself to be rattled by Brentford's shaven-haired pit bull of a full-back Alan McCormack, who had a real, Danny Mills-funk on.

But thankfully Sako reclaimed his calm and, on the stroke of half-time, conjured a counter attack which drew from Jonathan Douglas an heroic, goal-saving tackle as the Frenchman teed-up Henry.

Brentford's fans celebrated Douglas' intervention and for a moment it seemed Wolves had squandered a critical opening. But after a quick throw, a burst and pull-back from McDonald, Henry arrived at the near post and flipped a half-cross, half shot over David Button.

That gave Wolves the second-half building block they wanted; sit-in and wait for that moment when Brentford would be over-exposed.

And sure enough, after 72 minutes, out sprang Sako to spot Jacobs' surging run for a finish drilled under Button as he advanced.

The coup de grace was even better and set up by Golbourne as he took a rare opportunity to advance in attacking support.

The finish Jacobs drilled in from 20 yards was his best yet for Wolves.