Wolves fans protest outside Molineux for Manchester United match
Wolverhampton Wanderers have been called out by a former player for their recent recruitment strategy.
Former Wolves left wing-back Micky Gray believes the Old Gold’s approach to selling their best players has finally caught up with them, causing the dramatic fall-off so far this season.
Wolves have claimed just two points from the first 45 available and are 13 points adrift from safety ahead of their trip to Premier League leaders Arsenal. It has been 232 days since Wanderers last won in the English top flight and in that time the club has had three managers, two sporting directors and one technical director.
To say Wolves are unsettled is an understatement, and Gray, who played 47 times for the Old Gold between 2007 and 2009, reckons this campaign’s struggles have been down to the failure to replace those sold.
Wolves dealt ‘it doesn’t work that way’ verdict by former player
As much as Wolves have done fairly well to kick on despite selling the likes of Pedro Neto, Matheus Nunes, Ruben Neves and Maximilian Kilman in the past two years, letting Matheus Cunha and Rayan Ait-Nouri depart for the Manchester clubs in the summer was a step too far.
Gray thinks Wolves’ status as a selling club was always going to catch up with them eventually and that this campaign’s results so far are a direct result of the summer business – as well as the failure to properly replace the two star men who left.
In an exclusive interview with BirminghamWorld, Gray said: “There's a time where all these great players that Wolves have had over the last five, six, seven years... you can't keep selling your best players and replacing them and think that the roses are going to keep growing in the garden. It doesn't work that way.
“I think they've now found themselves in a position where the players coming to the club now are just nowhere near as good as the ones that have left. You know, you talk about Cunha and Ait-Nouri, two great players who left just in the summer and you replace them with, what do you call them, mediocre players, if you like. And it's not going to fit.
“Then the problem is managers who were coaching these players who were walking through the door, you try and get the best out of them and it's just impossible to do. They might be actually giving their best, but their best is just not good enough.”
Is there a way back for Wolves?
There’s still a long time way to go before the end of the season, even if it has already felt like an age for Wolves fans watching their struggling team. But with plenty of time remaining comes a snippet of hope that Wanderers can perform a miracle and escape the drop.
Make no mistake, it would take such a miracle for Wolves to stay in the top flight considering they are already 13 points adrift from 17th. But the Old Gold breaking their duck with a win – either an unlikely victory at Arsenal or in a more winnable clash against Brentford before Christmas – could provide a lift.
As much as survival is possible, Gray isn’t so optimistic. “I think deep down, Rob [Edwards] is probably thinking to himself now, look, we're that far away from even getting out of the bottom three that it’s going to be an uphill task throughout the whole of the season,” Gray added.
“But he's got to set targets for his team of not having the lowest points tally come the end of the season. I think it's Derby County at the minute. And it's one game at a time for Rob, and he'll know that. January's a big month for him, he's just got to try and freshen up that squad if he possibly can. Just get a point or a result from somewhere that just gives everybody that little bit of hope on and off the field, and you never know,” Gray concluded.
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