Wolves attempted to keep Adama Traore before he left Molineux last year and now it has been revealed how much they offered him to say.
During his best years at Wolves, Adama Traore was one of the most exciting players to watch in the Premier League.
His incredible pace, mazy dribbles and Hulk-esque strength made him impossible to stop when he was in full throttle.
Previously lauded as “unplayable” by Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp, the 28-year-old could terrorise defences but often failed to deliver the most important part of any player’s game and that was the end product.
Traore would often breeze past multiple defenders, get into a promising position to cross or finish a chance and fluff his lines or fail to find a teammate.
This was the most frustrating part of his game, as he would have had the whole footballing world at his feet if he could combine his absurd strength, pace and power with quality in the final third.
The only exception to this was when he reached the peak of his powers in the 2019/20 season. At the age of 23, the Spaniard produced four goals and supplied nine assists in the league – his best season to date.
Sadly, he never kicked on from there and he joined Premier League side Fulham on a free transfer last summer, despite Wolves’ best attempts to keep him.
Wolves offered Adama Traore £100k-a-week
Last season, Traore was still on the five-year contract that he initially signed when Wolves were promoted to the top flight in 2018.
He earned £40,000 a week and while that is an unfathomable amount of money, some of his teammates were earning three times as much.
According to the Athletic, Wolves offered the powerful winger a £100k-per-week contract, an amount that was reportedly offered to him some years earlier when he was at the height of his greatness.
Unfortunately, when a book-balancing fire sale ensued at Molineux last summer, Traore was one of the players to leave and many are left wondering what could have been if he had the chance to properly work with Gary O’Neil.
Gary O’Neil could have got the best out of Traore
O’Neil has significantly improved the fortunes of so many players at Molineux, the biggest being Matheus Cunha and Rayan Ait-Nouri, who were a shadow of their current selves under previous managers.
If the Wolves boss had the opportunity to work with Traore properly, perhaps a similar success story would have unfolded.
After all, he has proven he can get the best out of his squad of players and whilst it wouldn’t have been a given with the Spaniard, he could have certainly improved under O’Neil.
Despite scoring his first goal for Fulham last time out, he has only made eight appearances in the top flight this term as a hamstring injury kept him out for most of the season.
Traore, who is in line to face his former club for the first time since leaving tomorrow afternoon, maybe would have been better off staying at Molineux.