It didn’t work out for Bruno Lage at Wolves – but there are much happier times now for the Portuguese tactician.
Lage was sacked by Wolves in October 2022, after a run of poor results.
Wolves won just one of their first eight games at the start of the 2022/23 season, and Lage was relieved of his duties after a 2-0 defeat by West Ham United.
The writing had been on the wall for a fair while, with Wolves falling to win any of their last seven league games of the 2021/22 season, losing five of those.
Some Wolves players were said to have disliked Lage’s team meetings, which could be long and counterproductive.
But Lage is enjoying happier times these days with Benfica, and a pretty impressive statistic came to light last night.
Bruno Lage now has highest Champions League win percentage of any Benfica manager ever
Benfica Head Coach Bruno Lage (C) celebrates with his team after winning Monaco during the UEFA Champions League 2024/25 League Phase MD5 match bet...
Photo by Marcio Machado/Eurasia Sport Images/Getty Images
There was more Champions League action last night, and Benfica took on AS Monaco in their fifth match of the League Phase.
Benfica ran out 3-2 winners, with Vangelis Pavlidis, Arthur Cabral and Zeki Amdouni all on target for the visitors.
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The three points take Benfica up to 14th in the table, and they are now in the play-off section, but just one point off the automatic places.
The goal will be to finish in those top eight places, but three difficult fixtures lie in wait, against Bologna, Barcelona and Juventus.
But there is belief in Lage, who is actually now the best manager Benfica have ever had in terms of the Champions League.
As per respected account Proxima Jornada, which closely follows Portuguese football, Lage now has the best win percentage of any Benfica manager in the UEFA Champions League (which began in 1992) with 45.5%. He’s won five of his 11 games.
It’s great to see Bruno Lage doing well in his second stint as manager of Benfica.
In the end it didn’t work out for him at Molineux, but he’s clearly got something about him, as he is showing at Benfica, both in his current stint and his last one.
Lage showed signs of great potential at Wolves, and had the team thinking about a potential push for Europe midway through the 2021/22 season.
Lage at Benfica (first stint, Jan 2012-June 2020) at Wolves (June 2021-Oct 2022) at Botafogo (Jul 2023-Oct 2024) at Benfica (second stint, Sept 2024-present)
Games managed – 76 Games managed – 51 Games managed – 15 Games managed – 14
Wins – 51 Wins – 19 Wins – 4 Wins – 12
Draws – 12 Draws – 10 Draws – 7 Draws – 0
Losses – 13 Losses – 22 Losses – 4 Losses – 2
Win percentage – 67.11% Win percentage – 37.25% Win percentage – 26.67% Win percentage – 85.71%
That win over Manchester United at Old Trafford in January 2022 got a lot of fans dreaming.
But Wolves just couldn’t sustain their form, with injuries not helping.
Lage has since suggested he wished he was more forceful about certain things at Wolves during his time as manager, and things might well have been different had he received a better level of backing.
Lage recently admitted he learned a lot from his time at Wolves, and clearly his struggles – both at Molineux and Botafogo – have actually helped to shape him into a better manager.
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