Wolves skipper Conor Coady: Let's rise to the challenge
Skipper Conor Coady believes the experience of Wolves’ players in Europe will be vital – as he called on his team-mates to rise to the challenge of a ‘tougher’ season ahead.
Wolves arrived in China yesterday for the club’s historic first ever trip to the Far East country.
They will use the week as preparation for the start of their Europa League campaign, which begins next week with a home leg against either Crusaders or B36 Torshavn.
Coady said: “The experience we’ve got in the squad is huge for us. We’ve spoken about it.
“There’s excitement within the squad.
“We speak to lads who’ve played in European competition before, Joao Moutinho, Ruben Neves, Rui Patrico, they know all about it so we’ll lean on their experience.
“European football is the challenge you want.
“We want to embrace it, we’re trying to learn different and new things.
“We know how hard it’s going to be this season and even tougher (than last season). People have watched how we play and do. It’s up to us to rise to that challenge.
“I listen to loads of people, so many people have said that to me, how tough it’ll be with the extra games in Europe.
“But we’re part of a big and brilliant football club.
“We’re excited by it, we want to do well in the competition, it won’t be the easiest thing in the world but we’re excited by it, and when we’re excited we’ll enjoy it.”
The majority of Wolves’ players have been together for some weeks, with the squad spending a week at England’s St George’s Park training base before heading out to China this week.
Coady added: “It’s brilliant to be back. You go on holiday and look forward to spending time with your family, there’s nothing better than that. But you miss the boys.
“It might sound a bit daft or soppy, but you end up missing them.
“It's a bit different to the last few pre-seasons but it's exciting.
“St George's was needed. The manager's big on getting us away and spending time with each other.
“The training was top drawer and we had time to rest and do it properly.
“We had a behind-closed-doors game against Huddersfield which was a good run out and a good test. There were a few ropey touches, as is always the case in the first game!
“We've gone into things a bit quicker, usually we ease our way into pre-season but training has been been really tough, double sessions, getting in at 8am and leaving at 7pm.
“But it's all geared towards that first European game.”
