Bruno Lage: Wolves must find next level

Saturday’s loss to Crystal Palace was the third consecutive league defeat as Wolves once again struggled to impose themselves on the opposition.

Wolves’ impressive season to this point led to some supporters considering a Champions League charge – which Lage did not entertain at the time.

And when asked if he feared the club’s current bad run was around the corner, Lage said: “Everything can happen.

“Imagine if we won these three games and you ask me the same thing, it could happen in the next three.

“That’s why every time we have to go game by game. I cannot understand what can happen in the future, the only thing we can understand is to be consistent and solid.

“I need to understand how my players are comfortable with 40 points and if they have ambition to go to the next level.

“Or, if they are very happy with what we are doing.

“We can look at the end of the season and if we finish fourth we get Champions League with Wolves, or can finish sixth or seventh and play in the Uefa Cup.

“Someone also asked me how important finishing eighth is.

“But what is important now is to continue playing the way we were playing – we can’t prepare the future.

“Every time is a time to learn and now I need to understand the behaviour of my players after this game. I hope we can learn and on Thursday night (against Watford) the players give me the right answer.

“In the end it’s about winning, but it’s also about how we come to play our game. If they do everything but we lose, we move on and we have a chance to win the next game. That’s why it’s important for me to understand the mentality of the players to continue to bring success for the club.”

On a poor day for the team, Fernando Marcal was one of few players who came away with some credit after creating some chances in the second half.

Moving forward the left-wing-back insists the club must overcome this slump.

“We need to put our heads up and turn this page because, for sure, the last three games weren’t good for us, we can do better because we have a good team, and we will do it,” he said. “I think we did start better and tried to find the space, and after for sure we didn’t do much better when we defended, and they got two goals like that. The second one was a penalty, but that’s football.

“At home we need to do much better. In the second-half we played much, much better but didn’t score. We need to think about the next game. In the first 10 minutes it was not too easy because we were compact, but we got some balls, and we need to do more – do much better.”