Steve Morgan jets in to lead hunt for new boss

Owner Steve Morgan jets back from holiday today to take charge of a Wolves manager hunt he hopes to complete by the weekend.

Morgan, who was on a ski-ing trip when Sunday's fateful events led to his pulling the trigger on Mick McCarthy's five-and-a -half -year Molineux reign, will be updated by chief executive Jez Moxey on the candidates lining up to fill the breach.

Wolves have described as "pure guesswork" reports last night that a three-man shortlist of Alan Curbishley, Neil Warnock and Steve Bruce had been compiled.

But the club do expect to conduct interviews of their favoured few by Friday in the hope that the new boss can have a full week to prepare for the trip to Newcastle and the start of the club's 13-game bid for survival.

Morgan and Moxey will meet their men in a secret location, away from Molineux, but suggestions that they have already whittled down the candidates to Curbishley, Warnock and Bruce – all former Premier League bosses – are wrong.

Curbishley, who has topped fans polls since McCarthy's exit on Sunday including pulling in a hefty 38 per cent of more than 6,700 fans in our online vote, does have an admirer in Morgan and is high on Wolves' checklist.

But the club are less enthusiastic about Bruce and Warnock following their sackings from Sunderland and QPR respectively this season.

Wolves are focused primarily on choosing a man to lead the team out of their current relegation peril and as some names fall by the wayside, others bid for backing.

Popular former captain Paul Ince, whose initial managerial path has been blighted ever since his Premier League chance at Blackburn, is among them having indicated that he would relish the 13-game challenge to reach safety.

"Paul would love the opportunity to show what he can do," said a source close to the man who was McCarthy's main rival for the job in 2006. "A big part of his football heart is still at Wolves."

* Wolves' new boss should at least have further options after Karl Henry joined fit-again Ronald Zubar and Jody Craddock in the reserves' 3-0 defeat behind closed doors at Arsenal's Colney training ground yesterday.