The Keen & Judah Show: Do Wolves need to sign a striker in the January transfer window?

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Liam Keen and Nathan Judah are back to discuss the good and the bad following Wolves' crucial first win of the season

Transcript

00:00moving on. We'll go with another Daniel finish on the, on the difficult one. Cause obviously,

00:04you know, I don't think there were too many poor displays about the wolves on, you know,

00:09on Saturday, like you say, it wasn't the best. We've actually seen them play better. I put

00:12Bella guard into this with a caveat. I mean, obviously it came on at halftime for Apollo

00:17Sarabia. I thought he did. Okay. I thought he did fine, but it was more the overall aspects

00:22of this third person in this, in this strike force when Gary Neal has played three up top

00:27rather than two. And it's just indictment that haven't really been anyone who's been

00:32strong. Who's wants, wants that position and wants to be starting every single week. We

00:37seen Bella guard at the start of the season playing, and that's, you've got a decent run

00:40of games. I had a couple of really good games, but then faded away, lost his place. And he's

00:44comes on in the second half. I think it's fine, but you wouldn't say that Bella guards

00:48are nailed on starter going to full. And I would say in two weeks time, you want someone

00:51to really hold that spot down. Pablo Sarabia. We all thought, Oh goodness me. He started

00:56again, but repaid the faith with Gary O'Neill scoring that opening goal. But after that

01:00didn't do too much, to be honest, if you, you know, and then you look at other players,

01:05Carlos Forbes, who, you know, it was a must-win game for Gary O'Neill. And I think he's got

01:08to trust his players. Hence why he played Pablo Sarabia, but Carlos Forbes, you know,

01:13wasn't used.

01:14Roberto Gomez is coming on in the, in the, you know, in the last minute of the game or

01:16a couple of minutes to go replacing Mateus Cunha. Wang He-Chan wasn't involved, but he

01:21should be back soon. But again, all of these players in this, this third forward position

01:25are not staking their claim to start on a regular basis. And I think that's a big issue

01:30for Wolves.

01:31Yeah. The, the final down on this, this week's episode is less an individual, more a concept

01:38if you will. Yeah. It's, it's that third position. You are right. Because Wolves have been nine

01:44last couple of weeks, but previously playing three midfielders and clearly wasn't working.

01:49And Gary O'Neill has clearly decided to move away from that. Now he may go back to where

01:53I'm sure there'll be some tactical reasons for individual games that he will play three

01:56midfielders again, with the strength of that sort of contingent in the squad. But at the

02:01moment he's been playing two and he's been playing this third attacker and we don't really

02:06have anyone that's taken it by the scruff of the neck, taken that opportunity with two

02:09hands and said, right, this is my shirt.

02:11And the players that fall into that, Pablo Sarabia, Carlos Forbes, Sean Ritner-Bellegarde,

02:15Gonzalo Guedes, albeit he was playing as a nine as well. Rodrigo Gomez and Hwang Hee

02:21Chan as a lot of players to consider a lot of players, you want position. And unfortunately

02:26there's not a single one of those players that you could say are grabbing that opportunity

02:30with both hands. So I thought Bellegarde did, did reasonably well. I thought he did. Okay.

02:35Thought he offered a bit more sort of aggressive running with the ball with, without, without

02:40the ball works harder defensively than Sarabia did gives Wolves a little bit more of an energy

02:45So I felt it was actually probably the right change, albeit Sarabia scored obviously two

02:49minutes into that game, but he's certainly not grabbing the opportunity with both hands.

02:55Sarabia yes, scored, but was, as was the rest of the attacking players for the most part

03:01in that first half, quite quiet Forbes. Last time we saw him was, was it the Brighton game?

03:08It was, yes, it was because he came on and came off again. It was really poor that day.

03:13Get as comes on Guinness, gets an assist playing on the right side, but comes on as

03:17a striker on this occasion, it's a Lampton, Rodrigo Gomez, as you say, come on, comes

03:22on with a comments to go runs around a lot. Very energetic. I think he's a player that

03:26probably does deserve more chances, but we've hardly seen him. So we can't say that he's

03:30played well. And he, as you say, with Huang, hopefully will be available for, for the Fulham

03:35game back from injury. And he's a player that has obviously got a lot of quality, but he

03:40was off it when he was fit and needed maybe a little bit of a confidence boost. So amongst

03:45all of those clearly talented players, there isn't someone that's just grabbing that spot

03:50and saying, right, this is my position. And what was the product going to need that? Because

03:53it goes back to the very top of the show. Wolves are too reliant, over-reliant on Mateus

03:59Cunha. And when you've got other players around them that are not performing, God forbid,

04:05any suspension or injury to Mateus Cunha could be quite devastating to this Wolves team at

04:08the moment.

04:10Yeah. And I actually wonder, even though we've talked about a plethora of players who are

04:13trying to take that spot, we do worry about a Cunha potential injury. I just wonder whether

04:18there might be a little bit of movement in January out and in, in this position, because

04:23for me, and the centre-back of course is the main necessity and I'm 99.9% sure they will

04:29be signing a centre-back whether that be permanently or on loan. But I just wonder whether Wolves

04:33could do with another, another striker or another forward who's scored goals in that

04:38Premier League. That'd be one to watch, I think, in, in January.

04:43And to be fair to add to that, it would depend really on how Hwang comes back from his injury

04:46as well, wouldn't it?

04:47Yes, of course.

04:48I think, I think you're right that that could be definitely something that there will, there'll

04:51be some movement in potentially, but it depends between now and January, how these players

04:56perform. And Hwang is the one that I'm looking at and thinking, if you can just get him back

05:00to even 70% of what it was last season, there's a player that's probably starting every week.

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