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I'm amused at how confident you all are in our impending failure. How can you be so sure?
I'll post my view as a Wolves supporter. I think there is absolutely a chance for failure, as with any promoted club. I think management, and the fans know the Prem won't be some easy party, but the Mendes connections are the key thing here. There will always be a supply of talent, at least on loan that will be good enough to survive. Why wouldn't Mendes make Wolves his club to showcase his best players in the most watched league on Earth? I'm wishful and optimistic, but cautious at the same time.
That's a reasonable post and one a fan would hope to come true. As we're speculating then I'll propose an alternative view that is informed a little by our experience.
You need to look beyond the current investment made by Fosun and Mendes in Wolves and ask why Wolves? It's an important question as, with no offence intended as Cardiff fall into the same category, you are hardly a glamour club in today's game or located in a glamorous location. These are important points as they make it easier for Fosun and Mendes to be more visible in terms of promoting their brands.
The motivations for Fosun investing in Wolves are I am not sure about. If there are personal ties there then you have a better chance of retaining them. Otherwise if I were a Wolves fan I'd be wondering when they were going to sell up and buy a club in London or Manchester.
Make no mistake your club is just a business investment for them, and if they get bored with trekking up to Wolverhampton and its associated attractions and would rather be closer to London, Paris, etc to take business contacts to see a game then they will move on. I think this is particularly true for Mendes who will be able to point to the success he can bring to even a 'small' club like yourselves when negotiating future deals for his stable of stars.
Other than the unpleasant period when Moxey was your chairman I've not really had any strong feelings either way about Wolves and would welcome your promotion normally. Now though I just see strong echoes of our purchased promotion season and I expect that all your older fans will not feel real achievement at the promotion as it wasn't really earned by the efforts of the Club or its structure. Instead a couple of people have interfered to such an extent that you are no longer a British football team but the plaything of the International elite.
Some fans won't care, for others this will all be an anticlimax. However, right now you are enjoying the pleasure of seeing some excellent football being played at Molineux and quite probably won't give a damn. It'll take a few years to see how this pans out for you but whatever happens you are no longer the Wolves club that has existed for many decades. Whether this matters or not depends on what you want from being a fan of a football club.
This has been speculated at length. The recognizable colours, badge, branding, etc make it very easy to market the club internationally. We are well aware that Guo Guangchang didn't grow up dreaming of Wolves as his boyhood club. Wolves are just one of many investments in this large conglomerate. The difference being, that Premier League football can offer immediate exposure for for Fosun that few others investments can. Wolves were a cheap purchase, compared with buying an established Prem club, or even a yoyo club like Newcastle.
After years of the Moxey spin, Morgan's lies (and stadium abandonment), we are thrilled for this. I get the point about being an international plaything. But being a British "club with soul" or perhaps a "real" club means nothing when your owners show little to no interest in offering an entertaining product. I'm confident the club's identity will forever be Wolves, unlike your owner's daft kit change idea, or the Hull Tigers fiasco. As long as Wolves are Wolves, at Molineux in old gold, I'll be happy to see some success after a very long painful period.
Wonder if their manager might go to Arsenal ?
Bearing in mind that Helen Menken/Cedric was recently banned on here for two months, how is it that the clown is now being allowed to post the same old crap as Beverly Wilshire ?. Mods please look at this asap - I cant stand any more of the mock Yorkshire prose to be honest.
How do you know that the owners wont decide to change the name, colours, badge etc if/when you get promoted ?. Basically you have no idea who they are or where their allegiances lie. I wouldn't feel so confident if I were you. Also a ten point lead can disappear very quickly in this league - lets see where you are when you have played Preston, Fulham, Leeds, Villa & Middlesborough, all away, in the next seven weeks.
All valid points but I think everyone is clutching at straws if they think Wolves are going to average a point less per game than the following pack over the final 16 games. IF we win tonight we'll still be 11 points behind with 16 matches left to play. It'd have to be a collapse of proportions that only Wolves have managed in recent memory. Oh, hang on - I see what you did there...