Wolves fans may have been hoping for a more eventful final day of business.

But there were no regrets from the Molineux hierarchy today, as the club continued to favour steady growth in place of the “boom and bust” era which preceded it.

Some fans wanted one more “marquee signing” as a statement of intent, others were looking for recruits to shore up perceived weaknesses at left-back and in central midfield.

But, while manager Mick McCarthy and his line managers Jez Moxey and Steve Morgan discussed the prospect of signing another striker following the early injury to Sylvan Ebanks-Blake, the final day of the transfer window passed with Wolves quite content.

The clutch of the current 21 senior outfield players who will now bid to build on its best top- flight start since Peter Knowles was starring.

Secretary Richard Skirrow was probably happiest of all. While colleagues up and down the country spent a frazzled day compiling and completing the paperwork for any number of deals, the Wolves official merely had the relatively simple task of sorting out David Davis’s loan to Scottish Premier League side Inverness.

Not that Skirrow has not had plenty of work to do this summer. Wolves’ biggest task has been to cut the excess poundage accumulated from the first phase of the McCarthy era in leading and stabilising the club in the Premier League.

Some 17 players have departed as Wolves have endeavoured to move on seniors whose role in the McCarthy reign was over – Halford, Keogh, Maierhofer for example – or place their younger generation with Football League clubs to pursue first-team experience.

In effect, this is Wolves making room for another wave of “in-coming” for the future as McCarthy endeavours to now advance the club from survival fighting to the security of mid-table and above, while owner Steve Morgan’s ambitious vision for Molineux takes further shape.

The major arrivals, though, were long bedded-in with Jamie O’Hara and Roger Johnson aboard weeks ago along with a new goalkeeper, Dorus De Vries, the replacement for the popular Marcus Hahnemann.

None of the spectaculars, then, witnessed at other clubs – to the concern of some fans worried that busier work from Stoke, Blackburn and Queens Park Rangers were changing the dynamics of Wolves’ standing in the Premier League pecking order.

But the 3Ms simply aren’t for turning. They have set their course and will continue to trust in the virtues that have carried the club on an impressive five-year journey of progress.

By Martin Swain