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Wolverhampton Wanderers supervisor Gary O’Neil is about to reject an strategy by Manchester United to hitch the teaching employees at Outdated Trafford.
As defined in larger element right here, INEOS – who assumed full management over the sporting operation at United final month – had been eager on “opening talks” with the 40 yr previous coach over a “potential swap”.
Whereas it was not detailed precisely what function O’Neil can be assuming had been he to simply accept these advances, talkSPORT revealed it was “mooted to be a training function”, moderately than as a direct alternative for present supervisor Erik ten Hag. This implies the swap would basically quantity to a “demotion”, regardless of the distinction in stature of United and Wolves as golf equipment. As such, talkSPORT contends O’Neil can be “extremely unlikely” to simply accept the proposal.
The 40-year-old supervisor’s standing inside English soccer has sky-rocketed within the final eighteen months.
Having beforehand labored because the supervisor of the U-23 squad at Liverpool, O’Neil was appointed because the senior first-team coach at Bournemouth underneath Jonathan Woodgate. He then saved this function after Scott Parker changed Woodgate, serving to the Cherries achieve promotion within the 2021/22 season.
Originally of the 2022/23 season, Parker was sacked by Bournemouth after a 9-0 defeat to Liverpool, describing the workforce as “ill-equipped” for the calls for of the Premier League as he departed.
O’Neil was handed the reigns as an interim supervisor in Parker’s place, earlier than being provided the function completely with an 18-month contract after an improved run of type. Regardless of the troublesome activity and the negativity surrounding the newly-promoted aspect, O’Neil led Bournemouth to a powerful fifteenth positioned end – 5 factors away from the relegation zone.
Quite bizarrely, the manager construction on the Vitality Stadium determined to exchange O’Neil with Andoni Iraola – the supervisor of Rayo Vallecano in Liga. Whereas Iraola is highly-rated inside Spanish soccer, it was a shock determination given how nicely O’Neil had carried out in troublesome circumstances.
The 40-year-old Englishman didn’t stay out of the dugout for lengthy, nevertheless.
Wolves provided O’Neil the chance to repeat his Bournemouth heroics at Molineux simply earlier than the start of the season, after Julen Lopetegui’s shock resignation as supervisor of the Midlands membership. Lotepegui was believed to have been concentrating on a top-half end for Wolves this yr, however didn’t imagine it attainable, owing to an absence of funding and ambition from the membership’s homeowners.
Wolves turned to O’Neil to regular a ship on the verge of sinking this yr – the same expertise to his one the earlier yr at Bournemouth – with the supervisor taking cost only a few days earlier than the season’s opener.
The opponent? Manchester United. The efficiency O’Neil’s aspect produced at Outdated Trafford was extraordinarily spectacular, outplaying Ten Hag’s aspect for giant components of the sport. Although they might find yourself shedding 1-0, they deserved much more; and it provided a template for achievement this season.
The very fact Wolves sit at present ninth within the desk, whereas Bournemouth are languished in thirteenth, validates O’Neil’s high quality as a supervisor on a number of fronts. And it’s this back-to-back success, throughout two totally different golf equipment in equally attempting circumstances, which may have impressed officers at Outdated Trafford.
O’Neil has shortly grown past the function of an assistant, nevertheless, that means INEOS must proceed trying elsewhere this summer time.
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