He plays the ball forward to Cutrone, whose inside flick to set Neto rampaging down the left is divine. The move begins, as so many of Wolves’ do, via Moutinho. One minute and 20 seconds later, Jota has scored. An improvement is anticipated, but no one foresees what happens next. Wolves switch to 3-4-3, the system which has served them so well since September. The 23-year-old wrings his hands to keep warm as he waits to enter the fray, then slaps Neves some low tens as he replaces his compatriot with 55 minutes and 39 seconds on the clock. It’s like throwing 10 chillies into a bland cheese salad. Then, on 52 minutes, Nuno beckons Jota to the bench. Wolves begin the second period in a more adventurous fashion, but a lack of cutting edge remains. He’s happy they’re controlling the game and urges them to stay patient and wait for chances to come. In the Wolves dressing room Nuno is instructing his players to keep persevering. Radio summariser Eves is frustrated by what he’s seen and is telling a colleague that Jota should enter the fray to give the team’s ponderous attacking ventures a more direct approach. Of far more interest are opinions on the generous helpings of leek and potato soup. Molineux collectively shrugs its shoulders and begins to forget it ever happened.Īt half-time, press room discussions on the action we’ve just witnessed last a matter of seconds. It’s a game only for masochists to derive pleasure from - and the Latvian referee mercifully brings the first-half proceedings to a halt without a second of added time. The on-field action is so bland that the prospect of later watching the race to see which constituency can count up their general election votes the quickest is abundantly more appealing. Jim and Karen Hunter, listening from the Isle of Man while decorating their house, oblige by scrawling a striking life-size resemblance on their wall, which they’ll cover over with new wallpaper. There is so little to talk about that Wolves commentator Mikey Burrows and his trusty sidekick, ex-Wolves stalwart Andy Thompson, have resorted to asking listeners to draw a picture of ‘Thommo’ in his mustachioed 1980s heyday. There’s little creativity from the flanks and Pedro Neto and Patrick Cutrone are barely getting a sniff of goal up front. Wolves’ 3-5-2 formation, ditched at the beginning of their current run of one defeat in 17 games in all competitions, is getting another outing owing primarily to a lack of back-up options in the forward areas. The third, from Neves, isn’t far off nestling in the upper tier of the Stan Cullis Stand. Two are fairly tame, easily-saved efforts from Neves and Moutinho. The first half in particular is a chore to endure. Between the seven of them they have made 291 first-team appearances, with Jota accounting for 182 of those and Jesus Vallejo 106.īut before Jota enters stage right, we must endure 57 minutes of insipid, vacuous, entertainment-free football. Jota forms part of an inexperienced bench. Coady, Joao Moutinho, Leander Dendoncker and Ruben Neves keep their places from the Amex, the rest of the side is made up of the remainder of his small senior squad. But a few days later he’s had a slight change of heart, selecting only Oskar Buur Rasmussen of those youngsters in his XI. He takes seven under-23 players to Marbella for a whistle-stop winter getaway immediately after the Brighton draw. At the start of the week the Wolves boss has considered making wholesale changes, as many as 10 or 11. When Nuno Espirito Santo’s XI for the night is announced, Jota is on the bench. The Jonny Bairstow of this Wolves team, if you will. He tends to be a player who thrives on being written off. Conor Coady and ex-Wolves striker Mel Eves both later suggest to The Athletic that Jota’s Besiktas heroics may not necessarily have happened without being on the back of that Brighton double salvo. A hat-trick against Leicester followed the next month, then no goals in five, then three in five.Ī confidence player? Perhaps. He began last season by failing to find the target in 14 barren appearances, then notched two in two. Four in six here, a drought of four or five games there. Jota’s Wolves goals have tended to come in clumps since he moved to Molineux in July 2017. The foundations for this tale are set 168 miles away, four days earlier, when Jota, after a goalless run of nine matches, finally gets on the scoresheet for Wolves, not once, but twice, in a 2-2 draw at Brighton. This is the story of Diogo Jota’s magnificent treble.
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