Wolves boss Nuno Espirito says goalkeeper Rui Patricio still has room for improvement despite the Portugal star’s stellar performances for the club since his arrival from Sporting Lisbon in 2018.
Patricio’s four clean sheets in the top flight this season are matched only by Aston Villa’s Emiliano Martinez and Southampton’s Alex McCarthy, against whom he can expect to go head to head at Molineux on Monday night.
In total the 32-year-old has kept 24 clean sheets in his 83 league games for Wolves having arrived with a bank of experience including playing a major role in his country’s 2016 European Championship success.
Nuno said: “When he joined us he was a top goalkeeper and a European champion who had played almost 100 games for Portugal.
“He has been amazing for us this season, but we know there are aspects he can still improve and this is what we are working on.”
It was not just his £16million price tag that ensured Patricio arrived in the Midlands with big expectations, but former Wolves keeper Matt Murray believes his performances since have made that sum “an absolute snip”.
Murray told local media: “Obviously you’ve got your elite keepers like Alisson and Ederson but all in all, with the way we play and the saves he makes, I don’t think there’s any more consistent campaigner in the Premier League.”
Nuno admits his preparations for the clash with in-form Saints has been far from perfect given his players’ relatively late arrival back from the international break.
He admitted: “It’s always difficult when we have the team travelling. It was a nightmare for the testing protocols to attend to all the players landing on different flights all over the country.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here