Wolves picked up another three points in the Premier League on Sunday, beating Sheffield United at Molineux – and Micah Richards has lavished praise on Gary O’Neil.
It was a game Wanderers were expected to win, but in the end, it wasn’t particularly comfortable.
Wolves enjoyed a good first-half and played some nice football at times, and took the lead through Pablo Sarabia, with Rayan Ait-Nouri crossing for the Spaniard to head home.
But in the second-half, Wolves were, frankly, abysmal.
Their use of the ball was very poor and every player just seemed a bag of nerves, which was very strange to see given the relatively confident start they’d made.
Ultimately though, it’s three more big points and O’Neil came in for a lot of praise from Richards…
Micah Richards hails the job Gary O’Neil has done at Wolves so far
Gary O’Neil admitted after the game that he didn’t like Wolves’ second-half performance on Sunday, but nevertheless, he was delighted with the win.
Wolves are now up to eighth place in the Premier League table and are firmly in contention for some form of European football.
Wolves are just three points off the tally of 41 they managed in the whole of last season, and have already hit 40 goals – it is the quickest they’ve managed to do this since the 1971/71 season.
Gary Lineker and Micah Richards spoke about Wolves latest result on The Rest Is Football podcast, with Richards full of praise for the Molineux head coach. He said: “It’s just staggering, isn’t it? It just shows you, when someone gives you a chance and someone is willing to work hard, they’ve got their plan and they can implement it and everyone buys into it along with good players, you get a bit of momentum – look what can happen.
“I’m just so happy for him. I think the stigma against him – and I know we always give the players credit but I want to look to O’Neil because it was the uncertainty and what was going to happen. A lot of people said why does he deserve this job. People wanted a ‘bigger’ name. He’s doing a brilliant job, long may it continue.”
O’Neil has done remarkably well
It’s nice to hear such high praise for O’Neil from Richards.
The Englishman really is doing a wonderful job and it is incredible that Wolves fans are now in a position where they can genuinely dream about European football.
This should not have happened. Wolves were supposed to be a relegation fight – as many pundits would have you believe.
We will see if Wolves can go on to get European football.
But even if it doesn’t quite happen, it will have been a sensational season considering the state of things when O’Neil came in.