Wolves finally sacked Gary O’Neil on Sunday, after the club lost at home to Ipswich Town in the Premier League.
The 2-1 defeat to the Tractor Boys proved to be the final straw for Fosun, and O’Neil was let go on Sunday morning.
Wolves had apparently decided they would sack O’Neil after the Everton defeat, but were said to have been lacking a clear recruitment plan at the time.
Things have accelerated since, and shortly after O’Neil’s departure, it was claimed Vitor Pereira was in talks with Wolves. And the 56-year-old is now in place as his successor.
In the end, there was just no way that O’Neil could stay given how poor results were and how alarming performances got.
We are about to enter into a new dawn at Molineux, and here are three players who might be quite glad about Pereira’s arrival.
Tommy Doyle
Doyle has perhaps been the most unfortunate player in Wolves’ squad in terms of not getting much game time.
Doyle joined Wolves permanently for £4.3 million in the summer after impressing on loan last season, but under O’Neil he remained the fourth-choice midfielder.
Mario Lemina, Joao Gomes and Andre were always ahead of him in the pecking order, and fans have often called for Doyle to play more often.
Pereira’s style of play entails trying to dominate the ball and having control, and this is something that could well see Doyle become in favour with Pereira right from the off.
Doyle’s game is all about getting on the ball and dictating games from those deep midfield positions, so he might be one player who’s particularly excited about the arrival of Pereira.
Rodrigo Gomes
Rodrigo Gomes was signed by Wolves in the summer window following a brilliant loan spell at Estoril.
He played mostly as a right wing-back, and shone with his pace, dribbling, attacking threat and work-rate.
Rodrigo impressed Wolves fans in pre-season, but opportunities under O’Neil were hard to come by for the youngster and seemingly, he just didn’t do enough to warrant more minutes in his eyes.
It’s likely he’ll be quite excited by the arrival of fellow countryman Pereira, who has surely got to try and do different things to what O’Neil did.
Pereira is no stranger to using wing-backs in his career, and with that said, perhaps Rodrigo will get a run of games in the position he became so familiar with last season, with Nelson Semedo to shift inside as a right-sided centre-back.
Hwang Hee-chan
Hwang was a real favourite of O’Neil last season, as he played regularly in a front three with Matheus Cunha and Pedro Neto.
But in 2024/25, the South Korean has mostly been on the bench.
He did pick up an injury earlier in the season, but his form either side of that has been poor and for some reason, he’s been nowhere near the same players. Some have theorised that Marseille’s summer transfer bid for Hwang may have distracted him.
Hwang will probably be optimistic that a change of manager might help him to start games again – and he seems like a Pereira kind of player.
By several accounts, Pereira likes his teams to press aggressively, and Hwang’s work-rate and defensive qualities have never really been in questioned.
And he also does have a goal in him, so there’s a chance this appointment could serve him well – presuming there are no plans for the club to sell him in January.
It was reported recently that several clubs are eyeing a transfer for Hwang ahead of 2025, so we’ll see if he sticks around.