Joao Moutinho making his presence felt at Wolves - both on and off the pitch
Moutinho’s impact has been as special as his arrival at Molineux was surprising
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Your support makes all the difference.Joao Moutinho made quite an impression on his first day with Wolverhampton Wanderers.
While Wolves supporters had to wait until the start of the Premier League season to admire their summer signing, his fellow players knew much earlier they had quite a player and quite a character on their hands.
“The first training session we had, he came out without his laces, which I found unbelievable,” recalls Conor Coady, the captain who will lead out Moutinho and Co in Wolves’ FA Cup semi-final against Watford at Wembley.
“It was as if he had got slippers on.
“He just had them undone, he just never did them up, just loose, and he can play like that.
“I just think it’s him – he’s quite laid back. That’s what he does and just to see him like that, it’s hard to explain.”
Moutinho smiles when asked about the incident a few moments later.
“Small things for the group to laugh,” says the 32-year-old. “It is not only me – Conor, Romain Saiss and Ruben Neves so it. All the players do.
“That is why I think we are a very good group.
“If I get rid of the beard I am 22! I joke every time, I try every day to be happy and to give what we want with happiness and a smile.
“We enjoy what we do a lot and, for me, playing football is the best work in the world. I don’t know how many players or boys want to be in my position.
“So I try to live my life with happiness and with a smile on my face. I try to do my best.”
If Moutinho is a light-hearted character, fans and team-mates will testify he is a serious footballer.
A steady start to life in England has blossomed into an outstanding winter and spring, leaving supporters pondering whether the 2016 European Championships winner is the club’s finest midfielder since their glory days of the 1950s.
Mike Bailey and Kenny Hibbitt, stalwarts of the 1970s, have cult status and could contest the title, but in less than a season, Moutinho has played his way into the conversation.
“He’s special,” said Coady. “I think we’re very lucky to have him at our club and as team-mate. “We knew the calibre of player he was when he came and we were all really excited to work with him, because we all knew what he had done in his career – he was a European champion a couple of years ago, which is crazy.
“But it’s the experience he brings in the changing room that’s amazing, he speaks to everybody, but he’s always messing about too, he’s like a kid.
“He’s fantastic to have around and a really special person, but I think what he has brought to the club is his professionalism, it’s absolutely fantastic.
“Everyone knows what he has done in his career, but to witness it first hand, what he brings, makes him really special.”
Moutinho’s impact has been as special as his arrival at Molineux was surprising.
Even in the big-spending, new era of Fosun, Wolves’ Chinese owners, the signing of an established Portugal international from Monaco represented a major coup.
“I have never had any doubts because I knew where I was going, and what players they already had,” said Moutinho, whose agent, Jorge Mendes, has the ear of Fosun and a large contingent of players at Wolves.
“I knew we would work hard with the coach to play good football, because they already did it in the Championship last season.
“They did a very good job, and they were going to buy one, two or three players to add more quality and more experience.
“I think from the first day I came here, I thought we could do something good.
“Of course, if you’d have said we were going to stay where we are now, in seventh position right now, and in a semi-final, would I have believed it? Maybe not. But why not?”
When gearing up to face the Hornets, Wolves can rely on Moutinho to strike the right mood.
He speaks of dousing team-mates in cold water during warm showers and of generally becoming the resident prankster.
Yet even in the latter period of his career, Moutinho’s ambition burns fiercely.
He speaks of not yet winning the Champions League, of playing on well into his 30s and admits, like Wolves, that he sees this semi-final as the start of something special.
“My ultimate ambition is to win the Premier League as I have never won it,” he says.
“First it is FA Cup if we can. We have a hard game on Sunday. If we think we are in the final, we have already lost.
“I have never won the Champions League. I was in the semi-final and quarter-final and I won the Europa League.
“I think day by day and year by year and this year we can win something. It is the Cup and we have a tough game and we need to prepare for that.”
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