Jeff Shi: We nearly bought West Brom and Nuno was going to be boss!

“Fosun was an investment fund for so many different industries and [in 2014] I was appointed as a managing director of investment in charge of the internet industry,” Jeff Shi explains.

“Fosun was also looking at some new areas to explore and sports was one of them.

“They asked me in my spare time to lead a small team of one or two guys to have a look and see what was around.

“We looked at many different sports, agencies, clubs, media companies, sports apparel, all these kinds of things.

“We were not initially keen to find a club.

“Then Jorge [Mendes] called me one day and said there may be a chance of getting into Wolves, but before that I had received another call saying there may be a chance to get into West Bromwich Albion, as their owner was looking to sell the club.

“I flew over here and had talks with Jeremy Peace [Albion’s chairman] but the deal failed because we thought the price was not right.

“It was £200million for a team that would find it very hard to stay up in the Premier League. You can pay £200m but you still have to find another £100m to buy players.

“When we spoke with West Brom I met Nuno [Espirito Santo] once in a restaurant to talk about the chance of taking him there.

“Jorge then said to us, ‘Jeff if you are talking with West Brom why aren’t you talking with other clubs?’ so I agreed and it went from there.”

Back at Molineux, operations off the pitch during the 2015/16 season were focused on trying to sort what would happen next in finding a buyer to take the club forward.

Sifting through the interested parties is always an education in these circumstances, as chairman Steve Morgan and chief executive Jez Moxey realised.

“We had 86 expressions of interest from the time Steve’s intention to sell was made public,” Moxey says.

“We set up a spreadsheet and every single call was logged, even the stupid and mickey-taking ones that you get in these situations.

“We would always take down all the information about who people were and how they could finance their proposal, but we had a lot of “tyre kickers”, people who were wasting our time.

“We had three credible potential buyers, but it got to the stage where even two of those weren’t really biting.

“It’s not for me to reveal any identities but one of those was from overseas and one partly from the UK with support from elsewhere. Bizarrely, I was actually on a boys’ trip to China and was in Shanghai Airport when I got a call from Peter Kenyon, which is how the Fosun interest first materialised.

“Peter, who had been chief executive at Manchester United and Chelsea, was someone I knew already and so when he called to say he had someone who was interested, I knew straightaway that this would be a serious one.

“We talked openly about the deal, they told us that Fosun had looked at 18 different clubs over a two-year period, and, for us, their approach and plans were head and shoulders above anything else that had been put forward.

“At the same time, they knew they could deal honestly with us, that we weren’t shysters who were going to move the goalposts as we went along.

“We both did due diligence, them on Wolves and us making sure we knew who they were and that they were going to look after the club. Both parties involved in the deal did everything properly. And once we had got through some of the initial internal issues, it actually progressed at quite a speed.

“It’s always worth mentioning that we were never going to sell to anyone unless they were credible. There was a sense of responsibility among all of us and Steve, as the owner, had a strong professionalism about doing what was right. His reputation and the club’s reputation were too important to sell to someone who wasn’t going to help the club progress.”

Morgan adds: “Don’t forget, Fosun are a big conglomerate with business interests across the world.

“We knew they had deep pockets, and that was in comparison to some people and consortiums who approached us who I just wouldn’t have entertained.

“Some of them were saying they had different people putting their threepence in and I just knew they were going to run out of money as soon as they bought the club. With Fosun, right from the very start we knew they were serious.”

It quickly became apparent that Fosun’s hopes of concluding a deal swiftly, well in advance of the beginning of the 2016/17 season, were not going to come to fruition.

“It was not easy because I remember firstly the timing was not so good,” Shi explains.

“The Football League spent too much time on the ownership tests. It was stupid. Sometimes they found a name on the Fosun board and it was the same name as a criminal somewhere. I said to them, ‘There are many people with the same name,’ and they investigated that and we would have to wait.

“Then they investigated the relationship with Jorge and me. I said, ‘The rules are there, you can check it all.’

“Eventually they agreed to the takeover but the timing was very late, it was early July. It wasn’t a big deal to do but it took so long and it left us no time to buy players and the first season was very tough.”

With Morgan and Moxey moving on, and Fosun coming in, what would become of Kenny Jackett, the head coach who had helped mastermind Wolves’ return from the potential abyss after double relegation? Morgan had been keen for Fosun to keep him on, and give him a chance under the new regime, but that was never going to happen.

“At the beginning of the takeover, we knew Kenny may go but at that moment we didn’t know who would come in so we wanted him to stay for a period of time,” Shi admits.

“I remember when Kenny asked me how long we wanted him to stay for, I just said, ‘Sorry, I don’t know’. The first choice was Julen Lopetegui but then he was called by Spain.”

Jackett recalls: “I always knew what was coming, it was a situation which had been building for almost a year since Steve had put the club up for sale.

“It wasn’t like something happened quickly and my position was suddenly under threat.

“I remember talking to Paul Cook, who was manager at Wigan Athletic, who suddenly went into administration when three weeks earlier he had been told that everything was fine. With Wolves it was different, and I had to have a bit of realism about what was around the corner.

“There had been some initial conversations with Fosun when they came in, and I had a few meetings with Jeff Shi, but I could see where it was going.

“To a degree I didn’t really want it to be dragged out. It had been a long pre-season but what I would say is that they were very good and professional with me, they treated me politely and respectfully and I was never given any false promises.

“Any new owners always have the right to pick whoever they want as a manager.

“Just as a manager has a right to pick one player and not another. They have a right to say, ‘You are not my coach now, I want another coach’, and whilst it’s not easy to take, you have to accept it.

“Although it didn’t get off to the best start, once Fosun got it sorted out you have to say they have been brilliant for Wolves, haven’t they?”

Revolution Of Wolves: A Premier League Trilogy 2003-2023 examines a remarkable period in the history of one of English football’s most iconic clubs.

Published by Pitch Publishing, it is being released at the start of the new season.

Join Johnny and Paul at the book’s official launch night at the Cleveland Arms tomorrow from 7pm.