Former Wolverhampton Wanderers defender Rúben Vinagre has insisted his move to Molineux changed his life.
The defender [has been speaking to O Jogo](https://www.ojogo.pt/) in a big interview today, discussing his disappointment at Sporting Club de Portugal and his ‘radiant chapter’ at Wolves.
The defender is currently at Legia Warszawa in Poland, the latest step of a wide-ranging career that’s seen him playing all over Europe.
He started his career in Sporting’s youth set up but oved to Monaco in 2014 and spending three years there before joining Wolves on loan in 2017. That was made permanent a year later and he spent the next two years at Molineux, making 70 appearances in total with three goals and two assists.
He’s yet to get near that number for any club since, spending time on loan at Olympiacos, Famalicão and Sporting before returning to the Portuguese side in a €10m deal in 2022.
That never worked out though and he spent the following years on loan at Everton, Hull, Hellas Verona and Legia before joining the Polish side permanently for €2.5m earlier this year.
He’s very much getting back on track at the Polish club, hoping to rediscover the joy he previously found during his time at Wolves.
“Coming to Wolves changed my life, because what I wanted most was to reach the Premier League,” he said.
“I would have loved to have continued but things turned out differently. I made this dream come true and I hope to return. I took the team in the Championship, I heard about the interest, and it was normal to accept, because I realized that they were putting together a project to move up.
“I had Nuno as a coach, Roderick, Cavaleiro, Hélder Costa, Rúben Neves, Jota. Everything went well and I stayed there, they hired me permanently and those were very happy years. It’s still the most beautiful story of my career, because we got promoted, we were champions and in the first year of the Premier League we reached the Europa League.
“It was incredible, I felt really good playing there, the context of the league favoured me, then there was the coach, the teammates, it was a fantastic environment. The Portuguese were always together, we had dinner.
“It was a small town in England where Portuguese was spoken. Rúben Neves was adored, he was the important man in the promotion, Jota too, then they signed Rui Patrício and Moutinho, and also Neto. A few more players with names, but there was a very strong connection with the Portuguese.”