Although he is still deciding on who will be his permanent Wolves captain, Vitor Pereira has praised the impact Nelson Semedo has had on the group during his first few weeks in charge at Molineux.
The defender was only recently handed the armband under predecessor Gary O’Neil but has been a constant presence under the Portuguese as his first-choice right wing-back, and Pereira believes Semedo been leading by example as Wolves progressed out of the relegation zone before the turn of 2025.
As well as giving his thoughts on Semedo, Pereira also spoke in his press conference ahead of Monday evening’s fixture against Nottingham Forest about Jorgen Strand Larsen’s displays in attack for the Old Gold, why Andre faces a race against time to be back for the match and the fitness of both Mario Lemina and Pablo Sarabia, who are yet to play since the head coach’s arrival last month.
On Semedo’s influence on the squad
“Nelson is a very good captain for us. He’s working hard, he’s giving the example to the others and he is trying to help the team, and he's a very good example for us to have as a captain
“Because I have time, I'm finding the personalities that I want as leaders in the team. At the moment, I’m not changing the captain and I’m ok with him, but I'm studying the personalities and I need some time for that.
“He’s a good player, he’s professional, he has the skills that I like, so it means that if the club was to ask my opinion, I would want to stay with him. There have been no discussions because there have been a lot of things to fix and to work on, so it's difficult for me to think about everything. But we will have time to sit down and discuss.
“He’s 31, but he’s like a boy. Sometimes I need to, ‘Nelson, please stop a bit because you are running too much’. Sometimes we can run a lot, but I prefer that they run with intelligence, but this is the kind of personality that we need in a team.”
On Strand Larsen’s performances
“He’s a very good number nine. But everyone, me as a coach or a player, can improve. A team can improve every time. That's why we need to work hard every day.
“He can improve a lot of things; aerial, duals, man to man, because he needs to play with his body, because if you don't play with your body, it’s impossible, and you need to fake movements and he needs counter movements. If he wants the ball into his feet, the first movement has to be into the space, and then he comes back to win this space. This is something that, as a striker, he needs to increase.
“But he is a player that is a team player. He works a lot, not only when we are attacking, but we are defending. He’s intelligent and I think he will increase his level. But I believe that he will score more and more goals, not only him, because I like to appear in the box with four or five players, not only with the striker.
“We will work on the spaces we need to attack, the movements that we need to do, and believe that the moment to go fast is the moment when the pass comes. Sometimes it’s the last run, but the run with intelligence to open the space and to attack the space, which is the best, because a lot of times we have three or four players in the box, and we need to find the man who is free to score.”
On Andre’s absence from training this week
“Andre is not a problem for us. He’s not here because his son has been born in Brazil, and a father must be with his son and with his wife.
“This is a moment that I cannot say, ‘No, you cannot’. This is a commitment between him and me. As part of this commitment is that he must come back for the game.”
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On Lemina and Sarabia returning to training
“Mario has got a small injury and he didn’t start in a condition for the game, but he’s started back [training] but it’s step by step.
“The squad is short and I’m trying to find the solutions, especially in this moment, but I cannot put a player in risk because I need him for the next game. I don't like to push them. The player must come to me and say, ‘Coach, I'm ready to help the team. I feel 100% to help the team and to play’.
“Pablo is exactly the same. They’ve started [training] together, but we feel that they are not comfortable yet, but that confidence will come with time.”
On squad building in January
“We have a short squad and we don't have a lot of solutions for each position and it means that we need to keep the players and to bring one or two players to help us and to bring different solutions.
“It’s not the time to start sending the players out, but we need to have a balance in this. I know the month of January, when the market is open, every team will have happy players and some players that want to play more and have more of a chance to play.
“We understand everything, but in this moment, we need to think about the team and about ourselves. We need everyone.”
