New Wolves coach Vitor Pereira expressed his confidence in his ability to guide the struggling Premier League players to safety.
The Portuguese coach was appointed as successor to Gary O'Neill on Thursday, with the Midlands club currently five points off safety in 19th place.
Pereira joins from Saudi club Al-Shabab on an 18-month contract, with Wolves reportedly set to pay £825,000 in compensation.
His first match in charge will be against Leicester on Saturday and the 56-year-old is relishing the opportunity to maintain Wolves' place in the Premier League.
“Of course it's a responsibility but it's a good responsibility.
“Now is the time to give them confidence, to guide them like a tactical GPS. To put them in the same direction, to connect them and face them with confidence, and play with courage.
“I studied before I accepted the job. Of course we need to improve some aspects of the game. But we have good players, a player with confidence can do a lot of things, he can change everything.
“My idea is to create an identity, a tactical identity. In the first training we started working on this identity and way of playing.
Welcome to the wolves, Vitor 🤝
– Wolves (@wolves) December 19, 2024
Premier League great draw
Pereira has done his hard work to guide Wolves to safety, with the club losing 11 of their 16 league games so far and each of their last four.
The former Porto coach admitted that the opportunity to coach in the Premier League was a great equaliser.
As for why he was attracted to the Molineux job, he added: “Because it is the English Premier League, and in my opinion, the English Premier League is the best league in the world. Something that has been my goal for a long time.
He added: “This means that I am in the right place with the best high-level players, the league and the managers. I am very happy to be here.”
Wolves' plans for January
Pereira did not rule out Wolves being active in the January transfer window, but said he would need time to evaluate the team first.
He said: “I think the club is open to doing that but at this moment it is important with the new ideas to understand the players’ answer on the pitch.
“It's important that I have at least one week to understand what I can do with our players, to study character and what we need. After that we will decide.”
Nelson's leadership
Pereira was asked if Nelson Semedo would remain captain of Wolves, with O'Neill handing the armband to the right-back after Mario Lemina was stripped of the captaincy.
He said: “Nelson is a very good boy, a good character, and now I am trying to understand where the leadership is on the pitch.
“It's important on the pitch. At the moment I'm studying. It's not time to make a decision, it's time to study and get information, and then we will decide the captain.”
