HAVING spent the season looking down on their Championship rivals from the footballing equivalent of 30,000ft, Wolves suddenly find themselves plummeting earthwards in a wobble that leaves their supporters worrying for the first time that they might miss out on automatic promotion to the Premier League.

Those fans, who were boasting before the game that they are only one league place behind Black Country rivals West Brom, who are bottom of the Premier League, booed their side off after they went a third successive match without a win for the first time this season.

The Wolves fans are notoriously fickle, not to mention nervous. But even though their side are still four points clear at the top, you can understand why they are starting to feast on their fingernails after a dreadful defensive display allowed Preston to reach sixth place and boost their own hopes of making the playoffs. Worse for Wanderers fans, two of the goals came from Steve Elliott, who abandoned their promotion push four months ago to revitalise Preston’s campaign, and he would have left with the match ball if he had connected with Billy Jones’s late cross.

It had all pointed to a routine home win for a Wolves side beaten only once before in the league at Molineux when Preston goalkeeper Andy Lonergan miskicked Youl Mawene’s backpass straight to the feet of Sylvan Ebanks-Blake, who was not in the mood to miss such gifts. But Elliott quickly equalised from a splendid left-wing cross by Ross Wallace and after Sean St Ledger took advantage of some more dire defending, got lucky when Chris Sedgwick’s miskicked shot in front of goal ended up on his toes.

Wolves manager Mick McCarthy said: “I bought him for those qualities and I said when I let him go that I didn’t want to see him come back and make us pay like that.

“We had to make changes at the back but you don’t expect that kind of defending from good Championship players, but when we cock it up, we do it big style. There’s no panic. We are a good side and if there is a crumb of comfort, it is that we are still four points clear with 19 games to go.”

With Wolves piling forward after Elliott’s second goal, referee Colin Webster appeared to give them a lifeline when he pointed to the spot 16 minutes from time, adjudging Jon Parkin to have handled in the area. But after consulting his assistant Steven Rushton, he restarted with a dropped ball.

The reprieve came too late for Preston manager Alan Irvine, who was still making such a song and dance about the original decision that he was sent to the stands on the advice of fourth official Paul Martin.

Irvine said: “I threw down the water jug in anger and was told to go to the stands. It might have made a dent in the grass but it was nowhere near anyone.

“I have never been in trouble before but I just reacted to that one.”

McCarthy, who claimed it was a definite handball, now takes his team to promotion rivals Birmingham for Tuesday’s FA Cup tie.

With Birmingham facing a fixture pile-up after their game at Blackpool was called off and Wolves also more anxious about the league, it is a game that, but for local pride, neither will be that concerned about winning.

Star man: Stephen Elliott (Preston) Yellow cards: Preston: Nolan, Elliott Referee: C Webster Attendance: 26,138

WOLVES: Ikeme 5, Stearman 6, Shackell 5 (Keogh 75min), Collins 5, Ward 6, Kightly 6, Henry 7, D Edwards 6, Jarvis 6, Iwelumo 6 (Vokes 71min), Ebanks-Blake 6

PRESTON: Lonergan 6, Jones 6, St Ledger 6, Mawene 6, Nolan 6, Sedgwick 6, Chaplow 6 (Nicholson 75min), McKenna 7, Wallace 7, Parkin 6 (Brown 86min), Elliott 8 (Mellor 86min)

Three’s a crowd

Wolves do not lose many at home. Yesterday’s 3-1 defeat against Preston, in which former player Stephen Elliott scored twice, was only their second this season, but when they do lose, they do it in style. Six of the past eight teams to have won at Molineux have scored three goals or more. Reading won 3-0 this season, while Stoke, Crystal Palace and Burnley all scored three or more in league wins last season, as did Morecambe in the Carling Cup