Lobos: At a crossroads, where is Nuno Espirito Santo’s side going now?

When the Wolves begin their 2020-21 campaign at Sheffield United on Monday, it will mark the beginning of their third consecutive season as a Premier League club, equaling their longest stint in the top flight since a five-year stint ended in 1982.

However, with a New signing record for teenage forward Fabio Silva worth £ 35.6m and a new three-year contract for the technician Nuno Espirito Santo, the buoyancy around Molineux remains.

However, after successive seventh places, their best performance in consecutive seasons since the 1960s, the club is at a crossroads as they try to figure out how, and more importantly, how long it will take to climb. the next step.

The challenge

Towards the end of February, before the coronavirus pandemic brought football to a halt in most counties around the world, BBC Sport was told that the wolves were assessing the magnitude of their rapid rise from the mid-championship and downsizing. previously bold statements. about how quickly they were able to get close to the top of the English game.

The enormity of the challenge of breaking into England’s elite was beginning to become apparent, and it was only underlined in the final two weeks of the national campaign.

When the Wolves led 1-0 at Burnley on July 15 after a five-minute stoppage time, it looked like they were on the verge of closing in on a point from Leicester and Manchester United in the battle for a place in the Champions League. There was a genuine belief that a place in the top four could be secured.

Instead, Matt Doherty was harshly ruled for driving inside the box and Chris Wood’s penalty took the life out of the Wolves’ Champions League dream.

The Wolves then lost at Chelsea, allowing Tottenham to finish ahead of them on goal difference. Arsenal’s FA Cup success meant that, for the fourth season in a row, all of the “big six” had made it to England’s seven European spots.

In the last 10 seasons, only four times did one of them miss the European qualification.

Among them, five of those six elite clubs have won 26 of the last 30 national trophies. It is a measure of their dominance over the English game that the annual preseason Community Shield has featured matches between two of the five elite clubs for 21 seasons out of the last 24.

Everyone at Wolves recognizes that breaking that dominance won’t be easy.

The vision

Speaking after the defeat to Sevilla in the Europa League quarter-finals on August 11, Nuno made his feelings clear.

“It is time to reflect and analyze,” he said. “The team that started the game is the same as that of the first game of the season. We made mistakes that we cannot repeat. We need more players.”

It was a rare public indication of unease, and given September 4, the only significant transfer business involving the Wolves had been Doherty’s departure to Tottenham, The alarm bells began to ring among some followers.

Those fears have been answered in the space of five days, with the arrival of Brazilian left-back Marcal, Portuguese midfielder Vitinha and, most notably, 18-year-old forward Fabio Silva for a club record of £ 35.6 million.

In announcing the latest deal, Wolves CEO Jeff Shi made two important statements.

One was to underline “any deal that the club makes”, purchases and sales, were made “to support Nuno”, something that he repeated, with different wording, three times in total.

The second was that the signing “shows that we will make a considerable investment when we consider it appropriate for the club.”

Fabio’s deal is interesting, and a source within the club called it “a no-brainer.”

The evaluation is this: the wolves have spent a lot on a player that many believe has a huge future in the game. If that turns out to be the case, they will have quickly found someone whose value will increase enormously.

If expectations are not met in the short term, Fabio’s youth means the Wolves will find a market for the player and their losses will be minimal.

At the same time, they have also found an answer to the obvious conundrum about what kind of player they could buy who would be content, initially, with being an endorsement of Raúl Jiménez, whose form over the past two seasons makes him the best player. first choice automatic forward.

These deals, including the sale of Doherty and continued interest in Arsenal side Ainsley Maitland-Niles, are part of a larger strategy to evolve the Wolves team and prevent it from becoming predictable.

“It is clear that it is a new cycle and we need to grow some aspects of our game,” Nuno said on the eve of the season. “I would like more control and more ball and more goals scored.

“Compared to our first season, now I think we can maintain our performance levels more. But we still have ups and downs. We need more consistency.”

Shi and Nuno are central components of this strategy, but for the first time since 2016, the planning does not include Kevin Thelwell, the Wolves’ highly-skilled athletic director, who left for the New York Red Bulls in February.

There has been an internal restructuring in the wake of Thelwell’s departure, but the search for a direct replacement is on hold indefinitely. Shi doesn’t see this as a problem, as even with Thelwell, he had the final say in any deal.

It means that the wolves are taking a step into the unknown. The roster that has served the club so well for the past three years is changing.

The challenge is to make the adjustment, while also putting even more pressure on those bigger clubs, but making sure they are not outmatched by like-minded rivals like Everton, whose stadium renovation plans are at a further stage. advanced, and have their own ambitions on the field with Carlo Ancelotti.