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Overcoming The Overconfidence At Molineux

Football is a beautiful game and deserves to be played beautifully – at least, that’s what they say. Sometimes the nitty-gritty nature of this sport can lead to a series of poor performances that don’t warrant any sort of extended praise, but when it comes to Wolverhampton Wanderers, they deserve every single ounce of good fortune that has come to them thus far.

The Midlands club are entering the Premier League once again off the back of a remarkable season last year in the Championship, where they were able to combine their seasoned players with a string of high-profile new signings to create one of the greatest second-tier teams in the history of the game. That may sound slightly hyperbolic, but when you examine their quality combined with what they were able to accomplish, you’ll soon realise that it’s something worth thinking about.

Nuno Espirito Santo’s men will kick off their EPL return this Saturday when they square off against Everton, in a game that they can’t afford to take lightly – and as you can probably tell by the title of this article, we think that they just might. When you’re on a hot streak in any sport, and in football particularly, it can be easy to get carried away in the moment. After all, Wolves are being backed by billionaires who are willing to do whatever it takes to get the club to where it needs to be.

But despite what some fans may choose to believe, there’s still a mammoth jump up in quality between the Championship and the Premier League. That’s been evident for as long as we can remember and to be perfectly honest, it’s probably due to Leicester City’s rise as to why we’ve forgotten that in recent times.

The Foxes were able to do the unthinkable when they managed to become the Champions of England, not long after they’d initially gained promotion from the second tier. They opened the eyes of the football world to the possibilities that were in front of them, and many are tipping Wolves to do the same thing.

The biggest difference between the two, though, is that Leicester didn’t have the kind of hype and pressure around them that the Wanderers do. Courtesy of their unbelievable signings over the last twelve months there’s an expectation of them, with no pundits really even discussing the possibility of them going straight back down to the Championship. Of course, that’s unlikely given the quality of their squad, but they certainly aren’t immune from it.

In terms of the game itself this weekend, it’s not going to be the walkover that a lot of people are expecting it to be. Whilst Wolves may have the new Adidas sponsorship deal, all of the momentum and an impressive squad, Everton have the experience – in addition to a few key additions that could end up making all the difference. These sides are viewed as being on level footing heading into the 2018/19 campaign, and it’ll be fascinating to see how they actually match up against one another.

Wolves can’t afford to go all guns blazing from the word go, because they’d expose themselves to the possibility of a counter-attack every few minutes. They need to play a calm passing game which is something that they’re no strangers to, before picking up the pace gradually through Neves & Moutinho in the middle of the park. Everton, on the other hand, will be forced into a defensive mindset early on, but they’ll need to be physical both on and off the ball if they want to intimidate Wolves and really try to get something from the game.