Wolves stormed onto the Premier League scene last season with Portuguese flair and a mission to not only survive but start to propel themselves toward a seat at the big boys table. While they didn’t quite break the big six hegemony, they certainly put the Premier League on notice that they would not be content with mere “best of the rest” status. With an enviable collection of young, high-potential talent that still has room to improve, Nuno Espirito Santo’s side staked their claim as the best season from a newly promoted side in the Premier League era. Raúl Jiménez hit a new high. Diogo Jota broke out as a scoring star in the second half of the season. The old/young partnership of Joao Moutinho and Rúben Neves at the base of midfield was steady, if not spectacular. The outside backs were dangerous and the central defense was reliable backstopped by steady veteran Rui Patrício in net.
In addition to a rock solid and consistently available starting eleven, Wolves slowly worked in even more high potential youth into the side throughout the season. Leander Dendoncker, Ruben Vinagre, Morgan Gibbs-White, and Romain Saiss all made spot contributions with an eye toward potentially making bigger contributions this season. The summer has seen Patrick Cutrone, Jesús Vallejo, Pedro Neto, and Bruno Jordao. Adding an entire front line and a center back to the ranks of rising players gives Nuno almost an entire U23 squad worth of players to integrate over the course of the season as well as in cup matches. The only concern with the transfer deadline looming is that there is precious little experienced depth despite the club having added the Europa League to its list of commitments. If they don’t get the same exceptional health and line-up stability this season some gaps could show if the above youth don’t step up.
Still, if you’d offered “we might fall back to mid-table from a European spot” as the outcome of Wolves’ second season back in the Premier League at this time last season, supporters would have snapped your hands off agreeing to that deal. If one of the big six falter in a significant way, Wolves are positioning themselves to be a serious threat to the supposedly closed shop at the top and they’re doing it in what appears to be a sustainable way as they continue to add youth to come in if/when the current crop of rising stars is picked off by bigger clubs.
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Fantasy Prognosis
Total Points: 1530 (9th); F Points: 191 (16th); M Points: 591 (12th); M+F Points: 782 (16th); D Points: 622 (4th); GK Points: 126 (13th)
Last season, Wolves were an average fantasy side with the defense doing most of the work to ensure that they stayed so. Some of this is down to the formation they chose (3 CBs and 2 wingbacks) which skewed the number of players designated as defenders on the pitch at any given time. Throw in Matt Doherty’s excellent season going forward and Wolves were always going to look like a defense-heavy fantasy team last season. The other feature of the Wolves defense helpful to fantasy managers is the amazing consistency of the line-up. In addition to Doherty, who was a star, and Jonny, who had close-to-star point-production pace but not quite enough minutes to truly qualify, Wily Boly and Conner Cody were unexpected top-30 defenders due to the strong number of clean sheets and their consistent presence in the line-up. If injury luck holds, expect more of the same as this group continues to get comfortable in the Premier League.
Speaking of getting comfortable in the Premier League, it took a while for the attack to adjust to a higher level. After a mere two goals and a lone assist, Diogo Jota looked like yet another prolific Championship attacker who wasn’t going to make the grade in the Premier League. Something clicked with the turning of the calendar to 2019, though, and the back half of the season saw him contribute seven goals and four assists. Joining the consistently good-but-not-great Raúl Jiménez, the newly prolific Jota gives Wolves hope that they might take a step forward in the attack in 2019-2020. Joao Moutinho and, to a lesser extent, Rúben Neves followed Jota’s production arc of being non-productive in the first half of the season only to improve dramatically (at least from an end-product point-of-view) in the second half.
The reason to point the difference in first half/second half production is to suggest that there is real upside to the Wolves attack if the second half of last season represented a real improvement rather than a temporary bounce. Given the ages of Jota and Neves and the track record of Moutinho, it is reasonable to expect that the improvement is real. Jimenez and Jota should both be top 10 forwards while Moutinho should be a solid contributor (a very reasonable 3rd or 4th midfielder in draft formats). Neves is the real wild card. If he adds end product to his excellent work at the base of midfield, either via set pieces or long shots from the run of play, he could join his teammates as a fantasy-relevant option.
Given what we saw from Nuno Espirito Santo and what we’ve seen, or not seen in the form of high-profile new arrivals, in the transfer market we should expect Wolves’ starting eleven to remain static from last season. That solidity is reassuring for fantasy managers in a world where the big six clubs are all fraught with rotation risks.
