Johnny Phillips: Gary O’Neil deserves a window of opportunity from Wolves owners

Fabio Silva and Sasa Kalajdzic could have remained at the club but that would have served no purpose.

Gary O’Neil had no intention of giving either player game-time, and the gap opening up for Nathan Fraser to gain some first team experience is far more useful in the long term.

Instead, the real story came with this quote from O’Neil – more than a week ago – revealing that Wolves’ financial circumstances changed during the window.

“The financial side of why, I’m not 100 per cent clear on,” he said. “Financial fair play or the position of the club financially.

“But it’s clear we still need to be very, very careful and even more careful than we thought when I spoke to you guys last week about the targets we were looking at.”

That is more than simply an admission that the goalposts moved mid-window, it is a tacit acknowledgment that targets were affected by the change in circumstances.

All Premier League clubs have been operating under the restrictions of profit and sustainability regulations but this demonstrates other factors at play.

The shifting sands of finances are nothing new at Wolves.

Julen Lopetegui also experienced changing figures and forecasts during his time at Molineux but he dealt with those challenges in a dreadful manner, enabling a sympathetic journalist to do his bidding in public before engineering an exit.

O’Neil is working in harmony with the club.

He knew the drill when he arrived last August and has since shown his capabilities in getting Wolves up to speed so quickly. The head coach is frustrated that the window closed without a number nine arriving.

But getting the necessary quality player in on an ‘option’ rather than ‘obligation’ loan-to-buy was never a realistic proposition.

A late deal for Corinthians striker Yuri Alberto collapsed. Fulham’s Carlos Vinicius was under serious consideration but that did not get far down the line. Essentially, finances limited the pool available.

Fosun have spent heavily during their time as owners and have taken Wolves to the next level since gaining control of the club back in 2016.

There is no onus on the Chinese investment conglomerate to keep pumping money in at unsustainable levels and this January was not necessarily a good time to spend more.

We saw a reluctance across many of the Premier League clubs to spend sizeable sums of money.

The much-trumpeted transfer deadline day media frenzy was a damp squib, with very little meaningful activity across the board.

As an aside, it was hugely unhelpful to the four Premier League clubs who had to play fixtures that evening, but others will argue that any genuine attempt to sign players should not be left until the eleventh hour.

O’Neil has been a victim of his early success to some degree.

The ownership is comfortable that the striker options already in the squad are enough.

And, certainly, Hwang Hee Chan’s return will alleviate some of the pressure on Matheus Cunha.

The Brazilian is becoming something of a talisman for the team but therein lies a point.

He cost £45million last year, illustrating what often needs to be spent to genuinely improve any team in attack.

O’Neil wants and deserves to see more transfer activity in the summer with a real need to strengthen his options within the squad.

These are good times now with a head coach and staff inspiring a squad they inherited.

With the supporters firmly behind the man in the dugout and a positive mood around the camp, there are now solid foundations to move forward.

Preparations and groundwork may be under way for a strong summer in the transfer market.

Wolves will always be answerable to the wider Fosun ownership strategy in Shanghai, so any spending in the close season will be tied to many factors beyond the remit of profit and sustainability regulations.

The new year has begun in dramatic style with a swashbuckling victory over local rivals West Bromwich Albion in the FA Cup and an unforgettable night at Molineux on Thursday in the Premier League when Wolves were on the wrong end of a seven-goal thriller.

With the team in a strong position in two competitions, these are certainly fascinating times ahead for the club.