As Gary O’Neil neared the end of his playing career, he juggled Premier League appearances with making birdies on the back nine as a scratch golfer. In 2012, he fell short in his bid to advance to the Open Championship at Royal Lytham & St Annes, one of Tiger Woods’ favorite courses, and former teammates recall O’Neil flipping through golf magazines in search of perfection, pages with tips you can put into practice at the London Club, in Kent, his local hometown at the time. In his spare time he competed in professional tournaments and became obsessed with the Masters.
It all speaks of his determination to achieve in whatever he does. Last summer, O’Neil was sacked by Bournemouth after 37 games in his first job, despite retaining the club’s top-flight status. Although that decision stung, he arrived at Wolves hungry to prove himself as an elite coach at a club where Julen Lopetegui had lost the appetite for the challenge. Now, for the second time in around 12 months, O’Neil is deservedly in the conversation for manager of the season, with Wolves a point behind in seventh before visiting Newcastle on Saturday. Then there is the prospect of a semi-final at Wembley if they beat Coventry in the FA Cup. What should have been a miserable season is going quite well.
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It’s worth remembering that Wolves sealed O’Neil’s appointment just over 48 hours before the start of the season, five days before their first match at Manchester United. Wolves supporters could be forgiven for wondering how they would have fared in pre-season under O’Neil. The signs were there at Old Trafford, even if they left empty-handed after a brilliant, spirited display. It’s been a rocky start – made worse by a Carabao Cup defeat at Ipswich in which they squandered a two-goal lead – but since bouncing back to beat Manchester City there have been few bumps in the road. If anything, the biggest frustration has been the series of VAR decisions that have cost them points, with the refereeing organisation, Professional Game Match Officials Ltd, admitting mistakes have been made in games against United, Newcastle and Fulham.
Wolves thought they were onto something special when they first spoke to O’Neil. They were impressed by the detail in a presentation he gave during a three-hour interview, in which he outlined his work at Bournemouth, the homework he routinely does on opponents, his preferred style, how it could develop and a core of Wolves players highlighted what he felt. convinced that he could improve. For Wolves sporting director Matt Hobbs, who in his first coaching role sought advice from Liverpool’s former sporting director Michael Edwards and others familiar with O’Neil’s work with the under-23s, the question became how quickly he could get the chance deal done.
A quiet, inquisitive personality, 40-year-old O’Neil acknowledges he is not a household name like Lopetegui and understood why a wave of supporters saw him as a disappointing appointment. It’s fair to say he won them over. His celebrations after their Black Country derby victory over West Brom in the FA Cup in January may have been lost in the embarrassing violence, but O’Neil and Wolves fans shared a special moment.
He pumped three times towards the away fans and last month he did so at Chelsea after an impressive 4-2 win when he was sheepishly led forward by the captain, Max Kilman, and Mario Lemina, a reliable marshal in midfield. Fists were raised again in midweek after Wolves defeated Brighton to secure a place in the last eight of the cup. “Not me [enjoy it], if I’m honest, but the fans seem to do that,” he said. “And now I’m kind of forced to do it.”
It is a sign of Wolves’ sharp progress. O’Neil’s appearance on Monday Night Football last October seemed like a breakthrough when it came to getting those outside their Compton Park training base noticed, but he made a big impression on his side from day one. Players were struck by his meticulous approach and felt empowered to execute his game plans. Wolves’ ‘One Pack’ motto – which the more cynical will dismiss as an empty marketing slogan – feels appropriate. “There is no frustration in the locker room,” says Lemina. “We all know we get time to play. We are all part of the pack.”
Perhaps that is O’Neil’s greatest achievement, galvanizing a group that had seen teammates being singled out last summer and essentially told by Lopetegui that they were on the brink of relegation. Rúben Neves, Matheus Nunes, Nathan Collins and Raúl Jiménez were among those who left to balance the books and ensure Wolves were not at risk of breaching profit and sustainability rules. Those high-profile exits seemed alarming, but it allowed others to come out of their shells or rise to the forefront within a dynamic, vibrant team.
The continued emergence of Pedro Neto, one of the best players in the league this season, João Gomes, a tenacious midfielder who has proven to be an inspired £15 million signing, and Matheus Cunha, finally freed from the £44 million price tag, has been striking, while Hwang Hee-chan and Rayan Aït-Nouri have been revived. Lemina and Craig Dawson have excelled since signing just over a year ago, but the most noticeable impact has come in the final third: the league’s lowest scorers from last season now hold a devastating lead; they have scored 40 goals this season, nine more than last season.
O’Neil would be the first to say that others and his staff have been influential, including his assistant Tim Jenkins, with whom he worked at Liverpool and Bournemouth, and first-team coaches Ian Burchnall, the former manager of Östersund and Notts County, and former Crystal Palace midfielder Shaun Derry. O’Neil and his staff have worked tirelessly to build a solid defensive structure upon which attacks can be built. After a late defeat to Liverpool in September, O’Neil spoke of players “starting to do their own things because that’s just the way they’ve been playing for a long time” after José Sá threw a kick straight at Andy Robertson. , who scored seconds later. O’Neil’s message to his players before they beat City showed just how much work it takes to topple the best. “If it looks like a tactics board, we have a real chance,” he said.
The pack leader has little time to practice these days. “You feel like you can always do something to increase your chances of getting a result on Saturday, and that’s the most important thing,” O’Neil said last year. “I always swore I would find a way to be ‘Gary the manager’ and when I come home I would just be ‘dad and husband’. My wife will probably tell you that I haven’t quite mastered that yet… She [the family] Understand that this is not really a job. It’s a kind of life. Unless it’s to help Wolves get three points this weekend, I don’t spend a lot of time on it.”