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Wolverhampton Wanderers are the joint-fifth best performing promoted club in Premier League history after 29 top-flight fixtures, according to Opta, but the staggering stat doesn’t come without its negatives.
What’s the word, then?
Well, the west Midlands outfit currently lie in seventh position in the Premier League standings having accumulated 43 points from their 29 fixtures to date, and only five clubs have bettered that record since 1993 – Birmingham City, Ipswich Town, Blackburn Rovers, Nottingham Forest and Newcastle United.
It of course shows just how well Wolves have done this term that they are already safe from relegation – not mathematically but only team has ever been relegated with a total higher than the one they have now, and that was Crystal Palace with 49 in 1993.
More worrying is the teams that have matched or had a better record than Wolves, and where they find themselves now.
Wolves must buck the trend
Of the sides above Wanderers in the Opta stats table, only Newcastle United are still a Premier League outfit and even they have been up and down to the Championship a couple of times over the last decade. That should serve as a warning to the west Midlands team.
Perhaps the likes of Ipswich Town, Reading and Birmingham City – all of whom are currently plying their trade in the Championship – got too complacent after successful first seasons in the top flight, and took their foot off of the gas in many different aspects of their respective clubs as a result.
Wolves will know they can’t afford to do the same if they want to establish themselves at this level for years to come, and luckily they appear to have the ambitious owner and the links in the transfer market to ensure they don’t become a relegation-battling outfit – for the time being at least.
The fine margins are very small though when you see that a club like Southampton achieved four successive top-eight finishes and have since been involved in two consecutive relegation battles, and the Molineux outfit need to buck the trend and continue to rise from the current position they find themselves in.
