Wolves appoint new manager less than 24 hours after paying Lopetegui to leave
Wolverhampton Wanderers have confirmed Gary O'Neil as the club's new manager following Julen Lopetegui's departure.
The Spaniard quit Wolves after a tumultuous summer at Molineux, having reached an agreement with club chiefs for him to be paid off. The two parties reached a deal on Tuesday afternoon for Lopetegui - and his coaching staff - to be paid a fixed sum, rather than the entirety of his big-money contract.
O'Neil, 40, held talks with Wolves and impressed during three-hour talks at the back end of last week, as revealed by Mirror Football. That saw the ex-Bournemouth boss move into pole position ahead of other candidates and he has put pen-to-paper on a three-year deal.
O'Neil has been keen to return to management after being unceremoniously dumped by the Cherries' owners at the start of the summer, despite picking up a side that had been beaten 9-0 at Liverpool last August and were universally tipped for relegation, and dragging them to safety with games to spare. Andoni Iraola - ironically, like Lopetegui, from Spain's Basque region - replaced him on the south coast.
His first game at the helm will be Wolves' opening game of the new season at Old Trafford, against Manchester United, on Monday night.
Premier League winners and losers of January transfer window as £700m+ spent
Sporting director Matt Hobbs said: “We’re delighted to welcome Gary to the club. He’s a highly motivated young coach with strong principles and very well thought of by everyone he has worked with, and we’re excited to see what we can achieve together at Wolves.
“Our players have shown their quality during pre-season, and I believe Gary and his team will continue to coach and improve them and will have success working with this group. Everyone at Wolves is looking forward to welcoming Gary, offering him their full support and working collaboratively to help the club to keep pushing forward together.”
Julen Lopetegui has left Wolves (Getty Images)All has not been well behind the scenes for months, with the ex-Sevilla and Real Madrid boss growingly increasingly frustrated at not being able to revamp his squad. Lopetegui, who led the club from the bottom of the table on Christmas Day last season to mid-table safety after a remarkable turnaround in the second half of the season, knew that the likes of Ruben Neves and Joao Moutinho would be departing and wanted to be backed.
But despite bringing in over £85million in transfer fees and slashing the wage bill substantially, the only new faces are free transfers: the returning Matt Doherty and third-choice goalkeeper Tom King.
The 56-year-old had made Bristol City midfielder Alex Scott his top target, and Wanderers made two bids for the 19-year-old - the second of which totalled just over £20million. Lopetegui felt a deal would be done. But he was then told that interest had to be shelved for the time being after the club’s hierarchy insisted they couldn’t afford to meet the Robins’ £25million price tag... with a number of other deals also put on hold.
That left the Spaniard increasingly angry at what he perceived to be club chiefs moving the goalposts for a second time this summer. In an unauthorised interview which left the club's Chinese owners furious - and caused a complete breakdown in his relationship with chairman Jeff Shi - Lopetegui declared: “We went to a plan B, trying to think about cost-effective players, but we can’t develop this plan, too."
He also suggested he had been left in the dark over the extent of the club's issues.
Wolves, for their part, had backed Lopetegui heavily in the transfer market in January, spending over £75million to bring in a number of players. Lopetegui had pushed for striker Matheus Cunha, the £43million club record signing from Atletico Madrid - a deal members of the Wolves hierarchy have since privately acknowledged they overpaid on as they deferred to their manager's judgment.
The club also backed his decision to sell Collins to Brentford, despite sporting director Hobbs admitting he would have liked to keep the Republic of Ireland international.
Things ultimately reached a head over the weekend after news of talks with potential replacements - as initially revealed by Mirror Football. And despite weeks of speculation over his future and the club's statement on his exit saying he had been in discussions for weeks over a potential exit and was fully aware of talks with candidates, sources indicated on Monday night that he had given no indication that he would walk away.
Transfer news live - Fernandez flying in for Chelsea and Man Utd land Sabitzer
Within 24 hours, he was gone.
Hobbs and Lopetegui both commented on his departure, with Lopetegui saying: “I wish Wolves and everybody at the club the very best of luck for the future, and thank them for the opportunity granted at the time to take charge of this wonderful club."
However, notable by their absence were words from chairman Shi.
Read more similar news:
Comments:
comments powered by Disqus
