By Steve Madeley and Thom Harris
May 5, 2023
Decision time looms for Wolverhampton Wanderers and Fabio Silva.
After a season away from Molineux, rediscovering form and his love of playing football, Silva will return to the club in July for pre-season training. Then, both he and Julen Lopetegui will have big calls to make.
Does Lopetegui believe Silva is finally ready for the Premier League? And does Silva feel he can move his career in the direction he desires by staying with Wolves for 2023-24?
These are important times in the career of a player who remains in his development phase despite the £35million ($44m) Wolves paid to sign him. The size of the fee means the Portuguese is clearly regarded differently to other 20-year-old players.
But, having suffered a dip in confidence in his time on the fringes of the Wolves team, he has found belief again. Silva experienced a career high last weekend when he stepped off the substitutes’ bench in the Dutch Cup final — he scored the decisive final penalty in the shootout to help PSV Eindhoven claim the trophy at Ajax’s expense following a 1-1 draw after extra-time.
For now, Wolves have yet to make a decision on what to do with the forward for next season. Pre-season training will be the time when he and Lopetegui have an opportunity to size each other up.
A year ago, the picture looked clearer.
Silva had made 22 Premier League appearances in Bruno Lage’s first season as Wolves boss, yet only six were as a starter and he managed just 572 minutes in total. With Lage unable to guarantee an increase and Wolves keen for Silva to develop, a loan was the obvious call.
Since joining Anderlecht last summer, then PSV in January, Silva has delivered goals — seven in 17 starts in the Belgian Pro League at a rate of 0.41 per 90 minutes, and four in five starts in the Eredivisie at 0.7 per 90.He also delivered three goals for Anderlecht in the Europa Conference League and added one for PSV in the Europa League.
Now Lopetegui comes armed with information fed back from the Wolves staff who have made regular trips to Belgium and the Netherlands to watch and speak to Silva. He will need to decide whether he is ready to translate that form into the tougher environment of the Premier League, where Wolves now seem destined to remain after a fraught season-long fight against relegation.
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Much will depend on how comparable Lopetegui and sporting director Matt Hobbs feel the Premier League is with the competitions in which Silva has thrived this season.
It is undeniable that he has been doing what no striker at Wolves this season has done on a consistent basis — he has scored classic striker’s goals.
All seven of his league goals for Anderlecht came from inside the penalty area – five with his right foot, one with his head, one with his left – with some clinical finishes from wide positions across the goalkeeper. His goal on his Anderlecht debut in a 2-0 win over Oostende was a classic example.
Likewise, his reward in a 2-2 draw with Leuven was also impressive.
Silva spoke to The Athletic during his time in Belgium about rediscovering his confidence after a frustrating time at Molineux.
His smarterscout pizza chart (below) from his Anderlecht spell contains high scores for receptions in the opposition box and shot volume, showing he was deployed as an out-and-out striker with very little involvement in the build-up, as underlined by his low scores for “link-up play volume” and “xG from ball progression”.
The smarterscout analysis breaks down elements of a footballer’s game into different performance, skill and style metrics using a series of ratings from zero to 99 using real data and advanced analytics related to how often a player performs a given stylistic action or how effective they are at it. A full explanation of smarterscout can be found here.
Since moving to PSV, Silva has found minutes as a No 9 harder to come by due to the presence of Netherlands international Luuk de Jong.
It has meant some of his 568 minutes in the Eredivisie and Europa League have come wide on the left, where PSV have lacked a natural replacement for Cody Gakpo since his January move to Liverpool. Yet Silva has still managed to catch the eye.
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“PSV are very impressed with him,” says Marco Timmer, who follows the club for Voetbal International. “He’s a very open guy with good humour every day and he likes playing at PSV.
“It’s been difficult for him because De Jong has scored nine goals in his last nine games in the Eredivisie, so he will always play. So it was a big thing for Fabio to score the winning penalty in the cup final.
“He has scored four goals in 11 games in the league and, every time he gets on the pitch, something happens.
“He works very hard and he’s a different kind of striker to De Jong. De Jong is very important in the box, getting onto crosses and scoring headers, but Fabio is more of a footballer, so when he comes in they play differently.
Silva scores the decisive penalty (Photo: Marcel ter Bals/BSR Agency/Getty Images)
“He has a good connection with Joey Veerman and Xavi Simons in midfield, who are also pure football players, and they connect to work the ball through the field.
“I spoke with Fabio two or three weeks ago and he told me he really enjoyed his time at PSV because Van Nistelrooy and De Jong are both there — two massive strikers in European football — and he has learned a lot from them.
“It’s been good for him to get playing time and I think he now has a better chance in the Premier League than he had in the two seasons before.”
Wolves fans will discover this summer whether Lopetegui agrees with Timmer’s assessment or whether Silva is destined for another season honing his game elsewhere. Decision time approaches.
(Top photo: ANP via Getty Images)
