Wolves pre-season tour diary: Training access on day two

Pre-season tours are a privilege but always very busy and 2026 is no different.

After working until 11.20pm on Monday night finishing this week's article in our series of pieces marking 10 years since Fosun bought Wolves, it was another early rise on Tuesday morning.

After getting ready I headed straight to Wolves' impressive training base in Portugal to get my first look at Cesar Peixoto and his players in action, as we got exclusive access to the morning training session.

I do not do particularly well in the heat and always run straight for the shade on these trips, but fortunately some cloud cover at this first training session made it much more bearable.

But looking at the weather forecast, I might be in more trouble later this week!

Training was structured, fairly straightforward but particularly intense and it was positive to see Peixoto working his players hard as they will rely on that fitness and physicality throughout the Championship season.

My training analysis piece looks at the session as a whole, the fitness and tactical work and the group Peixoto has available to him.

Mateus Mane looked sharp and has improved physically, while we got a first look at new signings Kieran Trippier and Rafiki Said. There will be plenty more analysis on the team and individuals to come this week.

I recorded my daily video on the training pitches afterwards before racing back to the apartment to upload the video and publish my story about Ki-Jana Hoever.

The defender is expected to leave Wolves this summer and, similar to Tolu Arokodare, he has not travelled with the squad to Portugal.

Wolves already have three right-backs in the pre-season camp in Trippier, Pedro Lima and Jackson Tchatchoua and it makes sense that Hoever should be moved on.

It is a transfer that has not worked and after just 33 appearances in six years, it is time that all parties come to a good solution during the transfer window.

The afternoon was then spent writing up my training analysis and this tour diary before getting organised on interview preparation for a busy week ahead.

I managed to grab some time to watch France v Spain in the evening and it has got me excited to see England take on Argentina on Wednesday night in a huge semi-final.

I'll quickly be back to work, however, so stay tuned online and in print this week as we bring all the latest from Wolves' training camp.