Vítor Pereira has overseen an incredible change in fortune for Wolves since his December arrival. Here, we analyse what specifically is different and the extent of their improvement.
It’s quite easy to forget, as we sit here now in early May with all three of the Premier League’s relegated teams confirmed already, that Wolverhampton Wanderers looked doomed to go down for a while.
Although anyone could have looked at their team and seen numerous players of good quality, their start to the season was dismal. It took them 11 Premier League games to record their first win of 2024-25, with that run also including a sequence of five defeats in succession.
It was only the third time in their history that Wolves failed to win any of their first 10 games of a league season after 1926-27 (10) and 1983-84 (14), while their 23 goals conceded through eight games was the second most by any top-flight team at that stage of a campaign in the Premier League era.
Back-to-back wins over Southampton and Fulham in November eased worries briefly, but another run of four losses in a row proved decisive – the club could watch on no longer, dismissing Gary O’Neil on 15 December.
O’Neil had been quite highly regarded and did a decent job in his first season at the helm, with Wolves playing some eye-catching, fast-paced football that earned them – and their head coach – admirers.
But things started to unravel pretty much right from the start of 2024-25, their porous defence putting them at a distinct disadvantage despite them only failing to score in one of their first 13 games, a 2-0 loss at Arsenal on the opening day.
A 6-2 home defeat to Chelsea on Matchday 2 was a notable case in point. By the time O’Neil left following a seemingly unforgivable 2-1 loss to fellow strugglers Ipswich Town at Molineux, they had conceded 2.50 goals per game in the league, the poorest record in the division.
Two of the most consistent criticisms of O’Neil in reports since have related to team discipline (or lack of) and a perception of him overcomplicating matters on the pitch. Mario Lemina’s headloss at the end of the December defeat to West Ham – resulting in him losing the captaincy – and Matheus Cunha’s bizarre spat with an Ipswich security member less than a week later seemed to reflect the former; the latter, however, could perhaps be best summarised by O’Neil using five different formation variants across his 16 games this season.
Now, admittedly the classic ‘formation’ is seen as rather less important by many these days as there’s a greater acceptance that team shape is fluid, influenced heavily by on- and off-ball factors. However, it still provides some backing to the idea that O’Neil did a reasonable amount of tweaking, which isn’t necessarily conducive to familiarity nor, by extension, effectiveness.
While it seems O’Neil and his coaching staff were still generally liked by the players at the time of his exit, there was little evidence a turnaround was on the cards.
That’s what makes Wolves’ form since and the impact of somewhat left-field successor Vítor Pereira all the more remarkable.
Ahead of Pereira’s first game in charge against Leicester on 22 December, Wolves were five points worse off than the Foxes; after beating the same opposition again last weekend, they found themselves 23 points better off than Ruud van Nistelrooy’s men, who, of course, will be relegated.
Wolves were second from bottom when Pereira took over. They’ve since climbed up to 13th, though that arguably doesn’t illustrate their change in fortunes quite as well as looking at a Premier League table only taking into account results since the new manager took over.
Wolves’ 32 points in that time is bettered by only four teams, all of whom currently occupy the top four in the actual league table. It seems a pretty astonishing feat for a side who were exhibiting relegation form, doesn’t it? Well, that’s because it is.
We looked back at all managers whose first game in charge of a club was while they were in the relegation zone and at least 10 matches into the season; Pereira’s 32 points from 18 games is the most any have managed.
Similarly, Pereira’s 1.78 points per game is second only to Liverpool’s Arne Slot (2.41) among managers appointed to a Premier League job since the start of last season.
Contributing to all of this has been Wolves’ improved results against the so-called beatable teams.
Before O’Neil’s departure, this season Wolves lost six of eight games against opposition who started the day in the bottom half. Admittedly that does also include the MD 2 defeat to Chelsea, who began that day 15th, but they also went on to lose to the likes of Everton, West Ham and Ipswich.
Under Pereira, however, they’ve played 10 games against teams who started the day in the bottom half; they’ve won eight and lost none, and that includes a double over Manchester United and taking four points from two meetings with Tottenham.
A kind run of fixtures has now seen them string together six wins in a row, essentially making them the form team in the top five European leagues as no other side have won each of their last six outings.
It’s this sort of form that has Pereira frequently enjoying post-match beers with Wolves fans in a local pub. “First the points, then the pints” is the mantra that’s come to be associated with their winning run and the manager’s love of Stella Artois – and there’s been plenty of points.
That probably wouldn’t be the case had his priority not been addressing Wolves’ defensive frailties, and although Pereira broadly followed O’Neil’s lead with a back three, there are differences. For starters, Nelson Semedo and Matt Doherty swapped places, putting the more technically gifted Portugal international into a wing-back berth rather than wide centre-back. And January saw the arrival of Emmanuel Agbadou, who has impressed at the heart of Wolves’ defence since joining from Reims.
Another element that’s likely helped, and not just in defence, is that Pereira has stuck to a 3-4-2-1 formation in every game. Again, we shouldn’t look into the exact formation designation too much, it’s more about what that consistency represents – given Wolves’ form, it’s certainly plausible that such clarity has been helpful.
In terms of the football Wolves are playing, the differences are fairly pronounced.
Under O’Neil, Wolves were regarded as being a transition-focused team. For instance, from the start of 2023-24 until the former Bournemouth boss was dismissed, only four teams recorded more fast breaks (defined as a fast counterattack starting in a team’s own half with the opposition’s defence at least partly unsorted) than their 59; 51 led to a shot, also seeing them rank fifth, while their nine goals from such situations was the sixth most.
But Pereira instantly set out to make them more considered in possession, convinced that patience would help them become tighter at the back.
“We must find the right moment to go fast and the right moment to slow down and to keep the ball and to be patient to ‘cook’ the play,” Pereira told Sky Sports in January. “This is something that we need to improve in the future.
“I don’t want a team, I want an intelligent team. We don’t need to run too much, because a lot of times we run but we shouldn’t. I want to run in the right moment. When we recognise the offensive trigger, this is the moment to run. This is the moment to go fast.”
The graphic below illustrates the difference between the respective styles. While it might not look like a drastic transformation, you can at least see evidence of Wolves becoming more deliberate in their build-up.
So, having averaged 1.4 passing sequences of 10+ passes per match this season under O’Neil, that’s up to 2.1 since Pereira took charge. Similarly, their frequency of direct attacks (defined the number of open-play sequences that starts just inside the team’s own half and has at least 50% of movement towards the opposition’s goal and ends in a shot or a touch in the opposition box) has decreased from 2.1 to 1.4 each match.
Whether it’s a direct consequence of those changes or not is difficult to prove, but Wolves’ output has improved almost across the board, and most notably in front of the two goals.
They’re averaging more shots (11.6 up from 11.0) and expected goals (1.3 up from 1.1) per game, and they’re conceding fewer attempts (10.9 down from 14.6) and xG (1.4 down from 1.7) on a per-game basis.
And, as already mentioned, their form has changed dramatically with these improvements.
But, speaking after last weekend’s 3-0 win over Leicester, Pereira explained it’s not just his strategic changes behind their upturn.
“Confidence. Give confidence to the players,” he said. “I can speak about tactical but it’s about confidence; it’s about creating the right energy between the people and of course the tactical identity. When you come to watch the match, you will see a team trying to play, fighting together, tactical organisation.”
You don’t need to watch them for long to see that confidence flowing. Cunha, Jørgen Strand Larsen, Rayan Aït-Nouri, Agbadou and Semedo are just a few of the players thriving at the moment, and Pereira’s impact no doubt has more Wolves fans feeling a little more at ease at the prospect of some key players moving on in the summer.
Pereira also set about improving Wolves’ defending of set-pieces, having become alarmingly ineffective in such situations. Their 16 goals (including own goals) conceded from set-plays before O’Neil’s dismissal was double that of any other team in the division and meant they averaged one per game.
“I know a way to improve this with work,” Pereira insisted right at the very start of his reign. “We need to be more aggressive, more proactive and not wait in the zone. We need to be more aggressive in the duels, man-to-man. We need to open our body to see the movements, because if we close the pitch with bad body movement, we cannot see the pitch and it means we cannot anticipate the movement.”
Considering Wolves have only conceded five set-piece goals under Pereira, it’s fair to say he’s got them going in the right direction, even if their xGA at set plays has actually gone up.
It’s difficult to imagine Wolves doing much better than they have since Pereira came in, and considering the squad is almost the same, their turnaround is testament to the work the new manager has done.
It remains likely this summer is a relatively turbulent one for Wolves, with Cunha, Aït-Nouri and Semedo among the regulars expected to depart. But if the past four months or so are anything to go by, they’re in safe hands with Pereira.
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Points Then Pints: Vítor Pereira is the Toast of Wolves After Overseeing Remarkable Transformation Opta Analyst.
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