On Monday 20 April, Wolves officially lost their Premier League status.
It was a moment many have known has been coming for some time, yet for some it has hit hard.
The Old Gold will now drop to the Championship after eight years in the top-flight, and it certainly won’t be easy to come straight back up at the first time of asking.
There are many factors behind this outcome, and Molineux News now looks at 11 that have contributed to Wolves’ relegation.
It’s now official – Wolves are relegated from the Premier League after an eight-season stay… 🚨😔
Wanderers fans, where has it all gone wrong and who is to blame the most?!
Recruitment
This is perhaps the biggest reason of all why Wolves have been relegated.
Fosun’s modus operandi has long been to find those hidden gems for relatively modest fees, so that they can be developed and then sold on for two, three or even four times their initial price.
There have been success stories with this. But eventually, this way of operating was always going to come back to bite Wolves.
Last term, Wolves lost many key players, such as Matheus Cunha, Rayan Ait-Nouri, Pablo Sarabia and Nelson Semedo. Even Goncalo Guedes brought goals and assists.
They all moved on, and were replaced by gambles. Decent players, but gambles in terms of the English top-flight. Not a single one of Wolves’ 2025 summer recruits had any Premier League experience, and this really told.
In so many games, Wolves were easily beaten, and there was a clear gulf in quality between the two sets of players.
Simply put, Fosun played with fire and got burnt.
- READ MORE: The worrying disconnect between Wolves’ recruitment team, Vitor Pereira and Domenico Teti
Selling game-changers
Leading on from that section on recruitment, it is worth focusing on three players in particular that left last summer.
Cunha and Ait-Nouri were superb players, capable of providing moments of magic for Wolves.
Oftentimes last season, games would be on a knife-edge, and one of those two would come to the rescue. This season, Wolves simply haven’t had any players like them to bail the team out in times of need.
Even Pablo Sarabia, who didn’t always start for Wolves, was someone who could make a big impact off the bench.
There wasn’t really much Wolves could do in terms of keeping hold of these players. But again, the recruitment in terms of replacing them should have been so much better, and more proven players should have come in.
Vitor Pereira stayed too long
Like with Gary O’Neil the season before, there’s an argument to say that Wolves persisted with Vitor Pereira for too long.
Pereira was sacked at the start of November after the abysmal 3-0 defeat to Fulham. But he could have easily gone a month sooner, with Wolves putting in an horrendous performance at home against Leeds United. They lost that game 3-1.
The issue was that Fosun actually gave Pereira a new contract on September 17, which was essentially a reward for how he saved Wolves in 2024/25.
But this then meant that they had to stick with him in order to save face. Had they held off on that deal, they might have had the guts to act much sooner.
It later came out that Pereira had reservations about carrying on at Wolves given how the summer had gone in terms of recruitment.
Alarm bells should have rung then for Wolves, and his November sacking after he took just two points from 10 games just felt too late even at that point.
Not bite up top
At the time of writing, Wolves have scored just 24 goals in 33 Premier League games.
This is a horrible return, and a stat recently came to light showing Wolves had failed to score in 16 Premier League games (now 17 after Leeds).
This was as many as across the previous two seasons combined (2023/24 – 9, 2024/25 – 7).
It’s very simple – if you don’t have any bite up top in the Premier League, there is a very high chance you’ll be scrapping down the bottom.
Established players underperforming
There has been a sharp focus on the new players that came in at Wolves in 2025/26.
But there’s no doubt that a number of Wolves’ best players who’ve been at the club for longer have underperformed.
Jorgen Strand Larsen produced performances that were unacceptable, and fans rightly let him know what they thought of him during a game against Manchester United.
Neither Joao Gomes nor Andre have been anywhere near their best level.
Wolves took a major gamble with what they did in the transfer window, and that made it even more important for the established players to step up.
They did not.
How confident are you in Nuno’s prediction about Wolves after the club’s relegation was confirmed?
And was his exit the turning point at Molineux? 🤔
Atmosphere and mood problems
Naturally when a team struggles, the mood around the club can become a big problem.
Wolves fans have been extremely frustrated this season, with many just crestfallen seeing what’s been served up on the pitch.
The fans have actually been amazing this term, doing their absolute best to get behind the players.
But that hasn’t always been possible, and there really is only so much the fans can do.
At times, the players have been incapable of whipping up the atmosphere for games, and have instead invited hostility.
Once that tone has been set, it’s very difficult to reverse it and players cannot hope to perform at their best.
Molineux hasn’t been a fortress
As a follow on from that, Molineux has sadly not been the fortress it needed to be this season.
Of course, Wolves haven’t won away from home all season and that’s been a clear issue, too.
But it is always so paramount to be strong at home and Wolves simply needed a far greater return than just 12 points (so far).
Not enough fight on the pitch
With Wolves’ squad lacking quality, it was absolutely essential that the players would show a consistent level of fight, to kind of make up for that.
But in too many games, we’ve seen players ambling around (this was more under Pereira than Edwards, who improved the players’ fitness) shirking challenges and showing poor body language.
Some have just looked like they haven’t cared.
No leadership
This again goes back to Wolves’ recruitment, but there has been next to no leadership this season.
Toti Gomes is the club captain, but he has not even spent that much time on the pitch, putting the actual decision to make him skipper under the spotlight. We haven’t heard much from him as a result of his lack of minutes.
The armband has been worn by several players, including Matt Doherty, Joao Gomes and Jose Sa, and it has just felt like Wolves have lacked that one individual who’s going to stand up and be counted, and give both barrels to people if needed.
Rob Edwards hasn’t been good enough
Rob Edwards was an extremely brave man to answer Wolves’ SOS call after the club sacked Pereira.
He was doing well at Middlesbrough, and the fury from their supporters when he left after only a few months was understandable.
Wolves fans have been so behind Edwards, who played for the club and also held coaching roles. He’s even previously taken the first-team on a caretaker basis. So everyone has wanted him to succeed.
But, while he may have improved the culture, Edwards just hasn’t got the results Wolves have needed.
And recently, some fans have started to question if he is the right man to take the Old Gold forward, having made a string of odd tactical decisions in games.
There can be sympathy for Edwards as he inherited an absolute mess. But him not getting enough results has still been a key factor in Wolves’ relegation.
Fosun killed the mood
And now we come to the biggest reason that Wolves have been relegated from the Premier League: Fosun.
With Wolves having struggled so much on the pitch this season, fans took it upon themselves to express their anger, protesting at some games against the owners.
The feeling towards Fosun plunged to new lows this season, with protests even taking place outside Molineux in December against Manchester United.
Without doubt, this just heightened things around Wolves and the players likely suffered as a result of the building toxicity.
But supporters couldn’t be blamed, and were well within their rights to show their feelings.
Wolves are now going down to the Championship, and Fosun are massively at fault for it.
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