Jed Wallace ready to make big Wolves impact

Jed Wallace is hoping for an injury-free season with Wolves and has declared: "I'm ready to make an impact."

Wallace's debut year in gold and black was a frustrating one.

After playing catch-up due to an injury picked up in pre-season, Wallace was on the fringes of the side before being loaned to Millwall.

He then returned with an excellent performance at Burnley – before another injury put him out for a month ahead of three appearances in Wolves' final three games.

"It was a frustrating season for me," Wallace admitted.

"I went to Millwall and that maybe saved my season – it gave me a lot of confidence and bridged the gap from Portsmouth to Wolves.

"I came back and got three or four games in at full fitness so hopefully the fans saw the real side of me and what I was wanting to bring when I signed.

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"Now I am looking forward to carrying on from there and trying to make an impression on the starting eleven, which I plan to do this season."

Preparations for the new campaign are well underway, with Wolves hosting a behind-closed-doors friendly against Shrewsbury on Saturday.

And Wallace is desperate to make a big impact.

"I feel like I am more than capable of making an impact here, now even more so than I did 18 months ago," he added.

"Now I am ready to go.

"There have been a couple of difficult things off the pitch in terms of injuries and illness which caused me to lose a lot of weight last season.

"I worked hard to put that back on and get my power and my strength and my pace back which is a big part of my game with my running.

"When I am enjoying my football I play my best and I am looking forward to doing that this season at a club where I have made a lot of good friends.

"By my standards I don't think I made much of an impact last season and so I need to do better this season.

"As an attacking player I want to be getting people off their seats when I'm on the ball and I want to be causing problems.

"I fully back myself to do that and I am looking forward to showing the gaffer, the fans and my team-mates what I can do.

"We will be looking to improve massively on last season, both individually and as a group."

Wolves finished an underwhelming 14th last season despite expectations of a top-six finish.

A host of injuries and a lack of firepower and experience contributed to their poor form.

But Wallace feels that with a bit of fine tuning they won't be far away this season.

"We spoke a lot at the end of last season about how things had gone," he added.

"I think there was a lot of negativity around the way we were playing last season and sometimes that is understandable because you have got to make chances and win football matches.

"The flip side is we didn't really get well beaten last year – we were pretty much 'in' all of the games.

"With such a young and inexperienced group, a lot of the boys have now played a lot more football than this time last year.

"If we can just get our home form going in front of our own fans, and we entertain as well, all the experience we have gained will show.

"We had a difficult season last year with injuries and various things happening with the club but the group is feeling really focused and there is a lot of togetherness here.

"You felt that when things happened with Zyro and Jordan and their injuries and it brought us closer together as a group.

"We had to gather around those boys at that time and I am sure that brought the group closer together and that will show on the pitch this season."