Wolves sporting director Matt Hobbs leaves club in leadership overhaul

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Wolverhampton Wanderers sporting director Matt Hobbs has left Molineux with the club in talks to appoint former Sampdoria technical director Domenico Teti.

Wolves are restructuring their football department with Jorge Mendes and his Gestifute agency expected to be handed a more prominent role.

That change sees the departure of Hobbs, who has spent almost a decade at the club in various roles, including as sporting director since November 2022 after Wolves parted company with his predecessor Scott Sellars.

The club say Hobbs is departing by “mutual consent” and thanked him for his contributions.

Teti, 48, has been out of football since leaving Saudi Pro League club Al Shabab, where he worked with Wolves head coach Vitor Pereira.

Hobbs was previously chief scout and head of player recruitment, having started work at Wolves in the academy recruitment team. His departure will mean Matt Jackson, Wolves’ head of professional football development, taking on an increased role in contract negotiations and recruitment.

But it will also mean Mendes and Gestitfute , who were responsible for bringing some of the most successful players of the Fosun era to Molineux along with some less successful signings, taking on an increased role again. Head of scouting Ben Wrigglesworth remains in charge of the recruitment team but it is likely that Fosun and chairman Jeff Shi will again lean on Gestifute, as they did in the early years of Fosun’s ownership.

Head coach Vitor Pereira, himself a Gestifute client, will also have a big say in summer signings.

Hobbs’ influence had been waning

There was a time when Matt Hobbs looked set to steer Wolves away from their Gestifute era permanently.

For several years he and his recruitment team had wanted the chance to take charge of signings at Molineux after the hit rate of Mendes began to wane after his spectacular successes in the early years of Fosun’s ownership.

After Gestifute players, including Ruben Neves, Joao Moutinho, Rui Patricio and Raul Jimenez, underpinned an era of success unprecedented in modern times, less impressive signings like Matheus Nunes and Goncalo Guedes helped persuade Wolves to move towards a more conventional setup with Hobbs at its head.

After a successful January window under Julen Lopetegui, which included signings championed by Hobbs including Craig Dawson, Mario Lemina and Joao Gomes, it seemed the strategy was working.

And when Hobbs’ choice for head coach, Gary O’Neil, led the team well clear of relegation trouble and to within minutes of an FA Cup semi-final, it seemed that the British-led revolution was in full swing.

But the dramatic decline of O’Neil’s reign led Wolves to turn back to Mendes in December when they appointed Vitor Pereira, and the Portuguese was the driving force behind the signings of Emmanuel Agbadou and Marshall Munetsi in January.

Pereira is set to get a greater say this summer, meaning an inevitably bigger role for Gestifute and a diluting of Hobbs’ influence. The two parties have now decided a clean break is the best way forward.

Wolves have had joy before with the Gestifute model and there is no reason why it cannot work again. But if it does not and another change of coach is needed, it will prompt obvious questions about who within the club runs the football infrastructure.

(Malcolm Couzens/Getty Images)

This news was originally published on this post .

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