comment by Tamwolf (U17286)
posted 35 minutes ago
I do sometimes wish we would look at places other than Portugal. I guess due to the ease of getting up and coming players, it is the best place for us to look at this time. May change if we progress.
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Err... Brazil, Mexico, Equador, Spain, France, Denmark, Belgium and England. How many more places should we look?
Italy? Never seems to work in the Premier league
Germany? Too up 'emselves to fit in our happy group
Iceland? Tried that
Norway? Generally not good enough
Sweden? Possibly

I think as long as we are in bed with a Portuguese super agent who has half the players in Portugal on his books it's inevitable that we will be offered more Portuguese gems than anything else.

I feel almost insanely ungrateful saying this... But the Portuguese focus does worry me a bit Wolfie.

On the one hand it's a brilliant business move - we've developed a USP which gives us an edge over teams we otherwise simply couldn't compete with. For example convincing a potential superstar to join us because he can play with people he knows, people who have literally made the same move in previous years and have a manager who speaks your language, knows your culture etc and be part of something really, really close knit. That's something Tottenham and Arsenal for example can't offer in the same way and it must really help us. We also get the edge from having such a close knit group which other teams won't for the most part.

But the flip side of that is surely there comes a point where, as a French or English or German or whatever player, you think nah, I like the club and project but don't fancy risking not being able to break into that clique and feeling like a total outsider.

And are we setting ourselves up to make any post Nuno/Neves (or other big longstanding Portuguese players) etc transition more difficult by breaking that group up and not giving the following manager any chance of creating a new identity, culture, sense of cohesion etc without replacing most of the squad.

I don't know what the answer is to be honest but it's working brilliantly so far so I find it best not to think about it too closely and just trust the club is doing the required long term planning and immediate work to make sure the risks of our approach are minimised.

comment by GeminMallorca Wenger sort out VAR FFS! (U18318)
posted 6 minutes ago
comment by Tamwolf (U17286)
posted 35 minutes ago
I do sometimes wish we would look at places other than Portugal. I guess due to the ease of getting up and coming players, it is the best place for us to look at this time. May change if we progress.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Err... Brazil, Mexico, Equador, Spain, France, Denmark, Belgium and England. How many more places should we look?
Italy? Never seems to work in the Premier league
Germany? Too up 'emselves to fit in our happy group
Iceland? Tried that
Norway? Generally not good enough
Sweden? Possibly

I think as long as we are in bed with a Portuguese super agent who has half the players in Portugal on his books it's inevitable that we will be offered more Portuguese gems than anything else.
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I think you know what I meant. I'm not sure why the oldies on here feel the need to be so inflammatory at the moment.

common sense that we centre on portugal, all our best connections are there.

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Germany? Too up 'emselves to fit in our happy group
..............
ballox gemboy. great people and far, far better at fitting in to a new country than the english

I understand the concerns about the Portuguese domination but it’s working and I’d be confident about saying there isn’t a clique amongst the players from that nation. Nuno insists that no matter where the players come from then the language used at the club is English and if the players aren’t good at English then it’s a requirement that they learn

I think there is also the concern that we become reliant on that market too. There isn't going to be an endless supply of world class players coming from one place. To continue to grow, we will eventually have to start expanding our scouting pool.

Speaking of language at the club. Watching the Spurs documentary I thought it was interesting to see Mourinho and Dier talking together in portuguese.

Dier grew up in Portugal didn't he? Spurs signed him from Sporting.

If rumours are to be believed our focus has narrowed from Portugal down to one club, FC Porto.

Terry Taylor has gone out on loan to Grimsby, poor lad.

there is a photo on twitter on a portuguese tweet - of the porto stadium with superimposed gold and black lettering
" property of wolverhampton wanderers fc "

comment by Cinciwolf---Wolves-4th best side in the country---VAR 'not so fast'!! (U11551)
posted 1 hour, 27 minutes ago
Speaking of language at the club. Watching the Spurs documentary I thought it was interesting to see Mourinho and Dier talking together in portuguese.
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in a strange twist, I think whilst Dier play's for england he's not homegrown

Some observant people about, Wolves Twitter account normally follows 1877 other accounts, but its dropped down to 1874 overnight. The assumption being being three incoming players. Vitinha will be one, the Brazilian Pepe appears to be moving somewhere and the strong rumour is to us, plus possibly Esteves from Porto.

Still think we need a few signings. As it is, I still dont think we have improved our starting 11, in fact it could be argued that it is still weaker with Doherty gone and Jonny unavailable.

With the introduction of Vitinha and Silva the emphasis has switched now to wing backs. Be interesting to know whether Marcal has been brought in for the left wing back position or on the left of the back three

Esteves of Porto is a right wing back but is only 18 so difficult to see him as an immediate replacement for Doherty. Hope Nuno doesn’t have it in mind that Traore is the man for that job. Not impressed so far when played in that position

Telles would be a good signing for the left but Man Utd are widely tipped to sign him. And we have to remember that Jonny’s absence is only temporary so can’t see us spending big money filling that gap

Jonny will move to the right I think when he is back. He is out of position on the left and we could do with having a left footed player on that side.

Jonny is equally as good with his left as right and I haven’t seen anything in his game to suggest he is out of position. I did read that Athletico had signed him to replace their ageing left back so they had that position in mind for him too

Fiorentina took Cutrone from us on loan with an option to buy for £15m. It seems they are looking to offload him to Genoa before that £15m is due. Read these comments about him today written by the Florence press:
He’s not particularly good in the build up play, lacks the pace to get in behind, lacks the technique to beat a man and the vision to pick a pass and the strength to hold up play. He drifts in and out and only scores from close range and never performs against the bigger teams.

Apart from that I’m sure they like him

Sounds pretty harsh on Cutrone to me. Looked a decent player when we had him, just not really suited to us.

Apologies if this has already been posted.
Bruno Jordao is going to Famalicao on a season long loan.

comment by Spangles (U17289)
posted 47 minutes ago
Jonny is equally as good with his left as right and I haven’t seen anything in his game to suggest he is out of position. I did read that Athletico had signed him to replace their ageing left back so they had that position in mind for him too
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Jonny can use his left foot, but he naturally cuts inside. Jota does the same. We have no natural left footer out wide and we become narrow on that side. It was no coincidence that most diagonal balls go out to the right wing back, where we hold the width.

I'm not saying Jonny isnt good on the left, but let's not pretend it is his natural position.

The 'strong' links at this stage are

Vitinha signs today
Esteves still Friday according to the ITK on Molmix
Pepe also Friday according to same source
Telles the other link, vinagre going the other way

Not sure I am missing any other

Not sure what to believe at this point, think the telles talk may be wrong. Esteves seems like a move we would make. Pepe perhaps but can't say anything he has done is impressive thus far.

Mendes laing just terminated by cardiff and deleted all his social media

He's arrived...

https://twitter.com/CabineSport/status/1303689922524700672

Vitor Ferreira (I should have said...)