Wolves blog: Not your typical mid-table team

They drew 0-0 at Molineux before succumbing 3-0 at the Stadium of Light on the final day of the season, preventing them reaching the 100-point landmark, writes Tom Tracey.

This season’s Sunderland are stranded Huddersfield, who have now only won three games all season - and two of those have been against Nuno’s team!

Wolves were utterly woeful on Tuesday night. Every player was below par, every pass was half a yard short, every dribble was cut out with a tackle.

We had a few spells where we could have caused damage - but Wolves managed zero shots on target against a team who started the day 29 points below them.

Why Adama Traore didn’t come on is baffling - especially with how threatening he’s looked recently. Nuno got the substitutions all wrong in this game, with none of Ivan Cavaleiro, Morgan Gibbs-White or Helder Costa able to affect the game positively.

The two midfielders who played the whole game, Ruben Neves and Leander Dendoncker, had their worst games for a long while… but maybe it’s harsh to single anyone out in a poor overall showing.

Huddersfield closed everything down for most of the game, shutting down every avenue and preventing Wolves from switching the play.

When a team plays against us with such intensity and physicality, we really seem to struggle.

Credit to them, they deserved to beat us in both fixtures this season - and have earned six of their 14 points from us.

Huddersfield truly are our bogey team, and even if this doesn’t affect the players, fans may have had it in the back of their minds going into the game - I certainly did.

It’s matches like this that will prevent us from finishing seventh - give us games against Man United and Chelsea every week!

Too many times have we slipped up this season in this kind of match.

The team looked tired as the game wore on - as did Huddersfield - but no replacement for Raul Jimenez is a big weakness, and Wolves’ small squad shows at times.

The team looked better away at Bournemouth on Saturday, although still below the standards they are often able to reach. Nathan Ake was rampant against Wolves’ front line, blocking and tackling all over the shop.

He is an accomplished defender and could be an option for Kevin Thelwell et al to look at in the summer, although he wouldn’t come cheap.

The weekend’s opponents Cardiff won’t roll over at Molineux.

They have lost their last two games 5-1 to Watford and 3-0 to Everton, but Wolves haven’t been the kind of team to steam through teams this campaign.

Wolves will need much more to come away with three points. Hopefully the loss will spur the team on and cause a reaction.

But this is still a fantastic season, and Wolves are in the last eight of the FA Cup - so it can’t be worth getting too down!