Exclusive: Wolves technical director Scott Sellars on Fosun, funds and the future

Faced with outside expectations, internal ambition and a clear business model, Wolves are trying to navigate a path to long-term success.

Owners Fosun invested heavily to help the club into the Premier League and then cement their position, before outlining a strategy to make Wolves self-sustainable through various commercial and marketing ventures.

In some ways the club was a victim of their own success when they reached the Europa League in such a short space of time and subsequently breached UEFA’s financial fair play rules.

But these days Wolves are careful and are balancing ambition with financial stability.

“Ultimately I work for the football club, the owners and the great people we have working here,” technical director Scott Sellars exclusively told the Express & Star.

“Over time we have developed a shared philosophy that is right for Wolves, and we’ll not risk the club’s future by veering away from that model in pursuit of short-term gains at the expense of long-term stability.

“We will continue to work in that way because it has brought us a lot of success in the past, and we believe it will continue to in the future.

“We’re a club that has done fantastically well at taking young talent, giving them the opportunity and developing them into excellent players.

“That’s who we are and sometimes we have to recognise that. I’ll work with Bruno in the parameters we’re given and look at what we can do in every window.

“There’s enough lessons in football to ask why would you throw money at it?

“Fosun said when they came in they’d spend a lot of money to get us there and then our task is to manage ourselves as a football business. We’re not a club that spends way beyond our means, we won’t do it.

“I don’t want to do it either. Football for me is about protecting the club as well, not just about spending loads of money and three years down the line everyone is out of work because we’ve spent too much and it’s not been a success.

“That’s not how you run a football club. We run it very diligently, as a business within football and I don’t want to change that.”

With success – and Wolves have had plenty of it – comes expectation.

At times this season the squad has flirted with Champions League qualification and they are still in the hunt for European football with eight games to go.

But the sticking point for the club again comes down to the balancing act between continued success and overspending.

Sellars added: “The club has come on so far in the last five years. Only eight years ago we won promotion from League One and in the last four years we’ve had two seventh-placed finishes in the Premier League, a 13th place and now we’re looking at a similar position to the first two years.

“I understand we are all ambitious and want to go to the next level – there’s no doubt I’m ambitious and I’m sure supporters are too – but I’m also realistic and I won’t bankrupt the club to go up another two places.

“Fosun have spent a lot of money on this football club but ultimately the world has changed since then, for a lot of people and also for Fosun.

“It may change again but at the moment I understand where we’re at and what my challenges are. My challenges are to try to make money to use the money.”

There was disappointment, however, in Wolves’ lack of spending this season.

Using a committee-style system with Bruno Lage, Sellars and Wolves’ other recruitment staff, they made late moves for Sven Botman and Renato Sanches, before having a fairly quiet January.

But how does that committee work?

“It’s important that we all try and get to the same decision,” Sellars said. “I don’t want to sign players that he doesn’t want and I don’t ever want to sign players that he wants and I don’t want. It’s very much a team decision.

“There’s not just one person. Bruno doesn’t sign all the players and I don’t sign all the players.

“My job is not just recruitment, it stretches far beyond that, and more than anything I try to progress the football club in lots of different ways. But recruitment is always a big focus and it’s very much a decision together.

“We won’t all agree, all the time, but we’ve got to find a decision that is the right thing for the football club.”

Back in the summer Lage publicly called for a number of signings, which led to supporters assuming there was a rift between the head coach and the club’s hierarchy.

But Sellars insists they have a good working relationship and it is normal for any manager to want more signings.

He added: “Bruno is a really ambitious manager. A coach is always looking for the next player that is going to make you better and I understand every time he wants something, but we have a budget to work from.

“Everything that we do is done in agreement and we set the money, but I expect Bruno to be knocking at my door to find out what we’re doing and who’s coming in.

“I don’t have a problem with that. He’s a really ambitious guy and I admire that, but part of my job is to manage that sometimes.”

It is not always the most exciting option for supporters – particularly when they want big money signings – but Wolves also have a plethora of talented players coming through the academy. The under-18s recently got to the club’s first FA Youth Cup semi-final since 2005, while the under-23s have just dismantled Albion and Villa.

Former professional Sellars has a background in academy coaching and rose through the ranks at Wolves and values the contribution young stars can make.

He said: “It’s important for the community. Young boys should grow up knowing they have an opportunity to play for the team they support. But it also has to be something that works. That means it creates valuable young players for the first team, that’s the ultimate goal for me.

“Getting to the FA Youth Cup semi-final is great for the kids, but it’s not what I think success is. Success, for me, is players coming through.

“We have a lot of good young talent and a lot of them have been here since they were eight-years-old. The academy is the foundation of the football club and it’s really important to have strong foundations.

“We have a route here. They go to the academy, the under-23s and then it’s either a loan or they go into the first team squad.

“We’re always trying to give them the best development opportunity to give them the best chance to fulfil their careers. We don’t look at teams here in the academy, we look at individuals and what is best for them. We have some under-15s playing in the under-18s because we think that’s the right challenge for them.

“It’s also why Bruno works here because we’re a develop coach-led academy, rather than a team-led academy.”

Morgan Gibbs-White, Ryan Giles and Dion Sanderson are all enjoying successful loans in the Championship – a league Sellars hails as ‘fantastic’ for developing their best youngsters.

Decisions will be made on those three in the summer as they aim for a place in the first team squad, while the club has a group of even younger players that are catching the eye. Nathan Fraser and Tyler Roberts are two electric forwards who it is hoped will forge careers in the game.

“They don’t get to a FA Youth Cup semi-final if they’re not good players,” Sellars said.

“We’ll sit down and look at a plan for them. If they’re 17 and ready to go out on-loan, I don’t have a problem if with it, even if it means we won’t be as strong in the FA Youth Cup next year.

“For somebody like Nathan to have a year playing league football at 17 would be great for him, or we might decide he’s not quite ready. We look at them all individually.

“The majority of that group have played under-23s already, which is a strong group, and I see a lot of young professionals in there. What level is the difficult bit.”

Although it may not be quite as exciting as a new signing, Wolves fans also enjoying seeing a young player come in and take their chance.

Luke Cundle did that when he started away at Spurs in January and the midfielder has been a trusted part of the first team squad this year.

The club will assess in the summer whether it is the right time to give Cundle a loan or keep him with the squad, but once again it is all about balance as the club look to reward those up-and-coming players.

“If we signed a 28-year-old in his position, then Luke doesn’t get that chance,” Sellars said. “It’s important we leave some spaces for young players to have a chance. Max (Kilman) waited two years to become a regular, now in my opinion he’s been one of the best centre-backs in the Premier League this year.

“That’s because he waited and was patient, but also because there was a gap for him to come through.

“Luke’s mentality is very strong. He loves playing football and has a massive enthusiasm for it. It doesn’t matter if he’s playing for the first team or the under-23s, he treats every game the same.

“When I assess players, the key thing is their mentality. The ones with a strong mentality, the passion and love for football, they’re the ones that come through. The ones that don’t might have talent but they don’t make it.

“I’m hoping between now and the end of the season he’ll get some more minutes and we can assess where he is at and what his potential is.

“He showed against Tottenham what we all believed in, but with every young player you never really know how good they are until they play. He played away from home and gave a really accomplished, mature performance.”