Wolves round off their season with an away clash at Crystal Palace tomorrow and a home encounter against Brentford on the final day of the campaign on Sunday.
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Wolves manager Vitor Pereira.
Wolves manager Vitor Pereira.(Image: MI News/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
Former Wolves goalkeeper Matt Murray believes that the Old Gold can head into their final two matches of the Premier League campaign in a “really positive” frame of mind despite recent losses.
Wolves round off their season with an away clash at Crystal Palace tomorrow and a home encounter against Brentford on the final day of the campaign on Sunday.
The Old Gold sit 14th in the Premier League table, on 41 points from 36 matches played, with Vitor Pereira’s side having registered back-to-back defeats against Man City and Brighton & Hove Albion.
However, prior to those losses, Wolves registered a six-match winning run that hauled them away from relegation danger and into mid-table.
Whilst acknowledging that the Old Gold will want to finish the campaign strongly, Murray suggested that the final two games are a good opportunity to try out some new ideas.
The former goalkeeper, who chalked up 100 Wolves appearances in ten seasons between 1997 and 2009, told his club’s website: “Is this the time now when you do experiment a little bit? Try and find different ways.
“Because we are safe, we’re in that privileged position where we’re not fighting for our lives, and of course you want to finish with really positive momentum, which I think we have got, but those are the bits I’ll look at – is there anything else we can do tactically? But Vitor Pereira knows what he’s doing.
“He’ll be hurting from this defeat (to Brighton), and this performance – which was okay, but it wasn’t our usual level which we’ve been used to recently. I still feel we can go into Palace and Brentford really positive. Of course we’ve lost to two good teams, but we’ve not been smashed 5-0 and 5-0.”
Pereira was appointed in December with Wolves sitting second from bottom in the table, with just nine points on the board from 16 matches played.
The Old Gold have picked up 32 points from the Portuguese head coach’s 20 league games in charge to date, leading to him being nominated for Premier League Manager of the Season.
Discussing last weekend’s defeat to Brighton, Murray said: “Everyone says goals change games and when you make a mistake and give them the penalty, that gives Brighton something to protect, but I’m still looking at the positives and looking at how far Vitor Pereira has taken this team.
“We were disappointed to come away from Man City with nothing, they proper took it to Liverpool in the second half at Anfield.
“He’s got high expectations and he believes. There are bits he’s looking at and maybe saying ‘if I’m going to lose (Matheus) Cunha, this is what I need to unlock teams when they sit in’.
“(Jorgen Strand) Larsen couldn’t start but I thought he gives us something, so there’s little bits, but ultimately, we didn’t get that goal at that key time and we couldn’t end up breaking Brighton down.”