It is seven months in charge for Gary O’Neil at Wolves, and few could really have expected the season to have gone quite like this.
Wanderers are currently sitting in 10th place in the Premier League table having acquired 38 points from 27 matches. Wanderers have scored 40 goals, which is double the amount compared to the same stage last season.
Wolves are also into the quarter-finals of the FA Cup, and have a very reasonable chance of going to Wembley for a semi.
It’s been an amazing ride so far, and today it has been reported that Wolves are now going to open talks with Gary O’Neil about a new contract.
It would be richly deserved for the job that he has done.
He’s done so many great things already, but something has been revealed today that goes a long way to explaining why the players love and respect as much as they do…
Gary O’Neil likes to keep in contact with his Wolves players away from the training ground
Football can be a ruthless industry.
There is so much at stake, and it can be a very serious business and quite cut-throat.
At a lot of clubs, it is a case of players turning up for training throughout the week, playing games and then going home.
The Telegraph have reported today about how O’Neil operates – and there’s one thing he does that suggests why he’s popular with his players.
The publication say that the 40-year-old ‘likes to keep in contact with the players away from the training ground’ and that his door is ‘always open to them’.
It is mentioned that when Mario Lemina’s father sadly passed away, O’Neil instructed him to have as much time off as he needed.
O’Neil has man-management skills to boot
So not only is O’Neil a great tactician and someone who is adaptable in games, he is also a great human being.
A lot of managers will not be like this. Many are cold and unapproachable. But for O’Neil, it is important to have that connection with his players, and have a stronger bond.
Players are always going to respect a manager more if they treat them as normal human beings and not robots earning vast sums of money per week.
His man-management skills are a huge reason why Wolves are where they currently are in the Premier League table and FA Cup. Nelson Semedo said recently that O’Neil is just an ‘easy’ person to work under.
Simply put, the humble 40-year-old been able to command that respect from the players, who you can tell are ready to run through brick walls for him.