Changes are usually to be expected whenever a club brings in a new manager. But going from Nuno Espirito Santo and Bruno Lage to Peter Bosz, as Wolves appear intent on doing (The Telegraph), is like the footballing equivalent of sitting through a silent film before switching over to a Michael Bay action flick.
Bosz’s famously free-wheeling, often-kamikaze, popcorn-chewing brand of attacking football – complete with explosions and implosions aplenty – could hardly be further removed from the patient, often plodding approach preferred by Nuno and Lage.
But who could benefit from the appointment of a man who’s Lyon side scored 66 Ligue 1 goals last term but conceded 51? And who should be fearing Bosz’s arrival in the Black Country?
Three winners
Raul Jimenez, Goncalo Guedes and Matheus Nunes
With these three in the team, it almost goes without saying that Wolverhampton Wanderers should not be finding quite so hard to score goals or create chances. No one in the Premier League has hit the target fewer times this season than Wolves (four goals in ten games).
But if there is one consistent theme of Bosz’s coaching career, it’s that excitement and goals go hand-in-hand with the 58-year-old Dutchman. His sides average almost two goals per game. And his personal goal difference, from his appointment at AGOVV in 2000 to his sacking from Lyon this month, stands at a healthy plus-341.
Raul Jimenez has not been the same since his horrific head injury two years ago, but a lack of quality service certainly hasn’t helped. The Mexican should be encouraged, however, by the fact that Moussa Dembele, Karl Toko Ekambi, Kai Havertz and Kasper Dolberg all scored 18 or more goals under Bosz, playing the best and most prolific football of their careers.
Guedes, meanwhile, looked lost at times under Lage. The jet-heeled Portugal international can only benefit from Bosz’s commitment to rapid-fire counter attacks and high-pressing, high-intensity football. Matheus Nunes, a wonderful ball-carrier, is another who should thrive under new management. It was Bosz, after all, who helped turn another stylish and hard-working attacking midfielder – Lucas Paqueta – into one of Europe’s best and a regular in the Brazilian national team.
‘Beautiful attacking football’
Perhaps Adama Traore may be a man reborn too. There should also be key roles for attack-minded full-backs Nelson Semedo and Rayan Ait-Nouri.
“We want to win – and to do so in style,” Bosz, who led an Ajax team with an average age of just 22 to the 2017 Europa League final, said upon his unveiling at Lyon last year.
“I have a philosophy of offensive play, of attractive football. Because we play for the fans and not for ourselves. It is not easy, but it is possible to play beautiful attacking football and win titles.”
Three losers
Max Kilman, Jose Sa and Jonny Castro Otto
Max Kilman is one of the most talented young defenders in the Premier League. Jose Sa one of the best goalkeepers. Bosz’s track record when it comes to organising a backline, however, doesn’t bode particularly well for the players in Wolves squad paid to keep the ball out of the net. Kilman, Sa, Nathan Collins, to name but three.
Bosz lasted just a few months at Borussia Dortmund; an almost suicidal high-line seeing BVB concede 1.5 goals per game on average. A tendency to implode defensively also proved to be Bosz’s undoing at Lyon. No team in the top half of Ligue 1 conceded so many in 2021/22.
‘It was always fragile’
“While we were winning, I never had a secure feeling. It was always fragile,” Dortmund CEO Hans-Joachim Watzke said after firing Bosz in 2017; the Dutchman taking Jurgen Klopp’s ‘gegenpressing’ principles and ramping them up to 11, often with disastrous consequences.
According to reporter Santi Aouna, some players at Lyon simply didn’t understand what Bosz was asking them to do defensively. Others had broader issues with his overall tactical structure.
Kilman and Sa, then, can expect to see their workload increase exponentially under Bosz. Long-serving Jonny Castro Otto, meanwhile, looks ill-suited to Bosz’s preference for a four-man backline. Jonny has been an excellent servant at Wolves, operating in a wing-back role. He is, however, not quite as comfortable as an orthadox full-back.
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