Gary O’Neil met the media to preview Arsenal vs Wolves on Friday, where he confirmed how much the club has to spend in the remaining weeks of the transfer window.
There is a big expectation amongst the Molineux faithful that Wolves will bring in multiple new signings before the window closes.
O’Neil has lost two of his biggest stars this summer with both Max Kilman and Pedro Neto departing to fellow Premier League sides.
While the club did have a busy start to the transfer window, no new signings have been confirmed since July 1.
This has caused frustrations for supporters, especially after the money both Kilman and Neto brought in.
Now, O’Neil has confirmed why the club are ‘trying to be clever’ in the remaining weeks of the transfer window.
Wolves’ transfer budget ‘isn’t too different’ from last season
Last summer, Wolves lost many of its stars. Captain Ruben Neves was the biggest departure with Matheus Nunes and Nathan Collins also being notable sales.
This was justified due to the Old Gold’ troubles with FFP which resulted in the mass exodus of players.
While it is not believed that Wolves are at any risk of a points deduction for the upcoming season, O’Neil has still confirmed that the club will not be splashing the cash before the end of the month.
“At this moment the budget doesn’t seem too different to last season when I arrived,” O’Neil said.
“The club is still in a place where it’s not able to go and free spend on things
“We need to be clever with how we do things and we need to try and maximise the deals we can do and what I can get out of the players once we get them here.
“That’s where we are. When I sit in front of you guys (the media) I never ever moan about anything and I answer questions honestly to try and guide you guys to as close to the truth as possible.
“I love sitting here, I love what I do and I love working with Matt Hobbs to try and maximise it.
“Would I love to be able to say ‘that centre forward over there looks fantastic and he’s £55million, so let’s get him in’ – of course.
“But what we’re doing is very different to that and we’re trying our best to maximise it.
“It makes the reward at the end when you’re successful much sweeter when you have to work this hard.
“Last season was the same. I know we fell away towards the end, but some of those highs, considering where we’d been, felt so much sweeter because of where we’d been.
“This year won’t be easy, everyone is working hard to maximise what we can do.
“But the club is still in a different spot to where it was a few years ago when it could just go and spend.”
Wolves cannot justify lack of spending
If this trend continues, Wolves will go down. You only have to look at the other teams in the Premier League and their spending this summer to see that the club will eventually not be able to compete with the rest of the sides in the division.
Jeff Shi ensured fans last summer when the club was riffed by FFP that Wolves would be able to spend ‘more freely’ this year.
However, this has been far from true. As it stands, the club have only spent money on Tommy Doyle, Rodrigo Gomes and Pedro Lima with Jorgen Strand Larsen’s move being a loan.
Yet, O’Neil has seen £90 million come into the club in sales, with more expected in the closing weeks.
While the Wolves manager reiterated that new players will be brought in soon, it is hard to imagine that they will be upgrades on Neto and Kilman given the recent news.
Wolves could well stay up this season, however, if this trend continues, they will eventually drop into the Championship and Fosun will have no one to blame but themselves.