Shropshire Star

Ruben Neves: Wolves' Raul Jimenez is one of the best I've ever played with

Wolves star Ruben Neves has hailed striker Raul Jimenez as one of the best players he has ever worked with.

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Raul Jimenez (Getty)

Portuguese international Neves has played with some of the best players in the world, including one of the greatest players to ever play the game in Cristiano Ronaldo.

Following his fractured skull injury from last season Jimenez has dipped in and out of form this year, but excelled in the win over Watford, and Neves was full of praise for Wolves’ number nine.

“Everyone knows Raul, he’s an amazing player and one of the best players I have ever played with,” Neves said.

“The way he works for the team is unbelievable. It’s really hard to find a striker as complete as him.

“He can do everything for the team. He can defend, he can link the game, he can score goals. He has a lot of quality. It’s really good to play with a player like him, and fortunately he got his goal.”

The 4-0 drubbing of Watford puts Wolves back on track for European football with the top seven still within reach.

And Neves is adamant the players still harbour lofty ambitions this season.

“It’s still possible (to reach Europe) and of course we want to go as far as we can in the table,” he added.

“But we can only do that if we win our games, we work and try to win the next one.

“Of course we will try to win every single game until the end. That is our main goal since the start of the season, win every single game.

“We know it’s not easy and it’s really hard to do, but that’s our mentality and our target, to win as many points as we can.

“It doesn’t matter where we are playing, we try to get the points.”

Head coach Bruno Lage was angry after the performance against Crystal Palace, in Wolves’ third consecutive loss.

Neves says the players felt it too, and were determined to put it right.

He said: “We were hungry to get the three points for the fans because they didn’t deserve that first half against Crystal Palace. That’s not us, that’s not how we want to play.

“Even if we have games we don’t play well, we gave everything for the team and the club, but that 45 minutes against Palace was really bad for us and the fans as well.

“This was about a reaction and getting the three points for them. It was about playing well and how we want to play.

“In the Premier League, as soon as you bounce back it’s better for the team.

“It’s really hard to play in the Premier League and every single game is hard to play. There’s no easy games, even when you play at home.

“We came from three hard ones but we worked really well.

“We could see during the week that this game would go for us, because of the way we work.

“The guys were really focussed on the work and hungry to get the three points, but mainly I think the way we played was amazing. That’s how we want to do it every single time.”