Once the man leading Wolves through tough spells in the Premier League, Mick McCarthy now takes the spectator role and realised something during Sunday’s Burnley defeat.
McCarthy spent almost six years at Molineux, taking Wolves back to the Premier League and keeping them up for two full seasons — a feat no one had managed in over 30 years.
Despite the rather unamicable end to his time at the club, McCarthy still feels happy about his time at Wolves.
He also knows a thing or two about Premier League survival and has given his opinion on his old team’s prospects for the season.
Mick McCarthy’s realisation about Wolves after late Burnley winner
Wolves again fell to defeat at the weekend, this time in heartbreaking fashion.
After going 2-0 down, Vitor Pereira’s men clawed their way back to level terms, only to concede again in the dying embers. It’s a familiar feeling for supporters of the Old Gold, but McCarthy sees this game in particular as damning.
On The Managers podcast, hosted by himself and fellow ex-manager Tony Pulis, McCarthy shares the verdict he reached when that injury-time dagger hit the back of the net.
On Wolves’ start to the season, he remarks: “I’m amazed at how it’s gone so wrong. Where does it go wrong? Where does it go wrong? Sold too many players?
“I don’t know. I haven’t been following Wolves in terms of how many players they’ve bought, what they’ve sold.”
Regardless of how they got here, McCarthy thinks the manner of their defeat to Burnley tells him everything he needs to know.
He continues: “They’re 2-0 down and I’m thinking, ‘Oh no’. They get back to 2-2 and lose in the 96th, 97th minute. You know, I know. If that’s happening to your team and you’re conceding like that, that’s a relegation team.”
The former Irish international would know, having presided over a Wolves side that was emphatically relegated just months after his dismissal.
Wolves must avoid a Mick McCarthy repeat with Vitor Pereira
With just a few months to go in the 2011/12 season, Wolves decided McCarthy wasn’t the man to turn the season around. At that time, they had just slipped into the relegation zone on goal difference, with a heavy loss to rivals West Brom sealing his fate.
McCarthy’s parting plea was for Wolves to keep fighting, but in his absence, they went the other way.
By the season’s end Wolves were dead last, 12 points from safety under the watch of assistant coach Terry Connor.
There may be a lesson there for Fosun. Doubts about Pereira’s future at Wolves are merited, but replacing a manager doesn’t always work out.