Head of professional football development Matt Jackson is excited to see how Wolves’ more senior players out on loan embrace their challenges this season, with Hugo Bueno already catching the eye at Feyenoord.
Bueno, Chiquinho, Ki-Jana Hoever and Fabio Silva are all spending the 2024/25 season away from Molineux in a bid to gain the gametime essential for their development.
The circumstances, targets and challenges of all four overseas loans are different, but Jackson is watching them closely, with Bueno already flourishing in his new surroundings.
The Spaniard, who has played 48 times for Wolves, having progressed through the latter stages of the club’s academy, joined Feyenoord in the Netherlands and made an instant impact with an assist on debut against PEC Zwolle.
Having recovered from a minor injury, the 22-year-old made his Champions League debut against Girona – a 3-2 win – and laid on another assist last weekend, continuing his side’s unbeaten start to the season with a 2-1 win over Twente.
Jackson said: “Hugo’s doing very, very well. He made an impact immediately, as soon as he went. Unfortunately, he picked up a little bit of a groin injury where he missed four games or so, but he's now back and into the real meat of the season. They've got some brilliant fixtures coming up.
“He's got Benfica away in the Champions League soon, plus the domestic fixtures, so we’re really excited to see where it goes as long as he plays the minutes now through to the end of the season. It’s absolutely great for him. He went there to play those big games, in big pressure situations.”
Jackson is hoping Bueno follows a similar path to Yerson Mosquera, who kicked on during his loan at Villarreal last season, meaning he returned ready for the Premier League and the Colombian played regularly for the Old Gold until his injury last month.
“We’re really reflecting on this period for him being the same way as Yerson at Villarreal last year, where he's now looking to prove he can start for us next summer. We made it pretty clear to him right through the summer.
“We worked very closely with his agent on exactly what our perspectives were. He had some early inquiries, and we had to balance the exact time that he was able to go out, and we're delighted with the choices we had. He backed himself to go to Feyenoord, and I think we will certainly find out an awful lot about him this year.”
Chiquinho began the season at Molineux and played against Arsenal in the Premier League and Burnley in the Carabao Cup. Now, he’s at RCD Mallorca and has come off the bench in their most recent three La Liga matches, providing a starting point for more minutes, Jackson hopes.
“Chiquinho needs to get in the team and knew he'd have that challenge. He had a chance here in pre-season, so Gary saw a lot of him with his staff and made the decision to send him out to prove to us exactly what he is next summer, so we've got all of the picture available. He has to make that impact, but he's going to be doing it at a high level.
“It's important that Chiquinho himself saw how Gary and his staff work, so he knows the expectation, the requirements, the qualities required to become a first-team player here. It’s really important that they know the bar they're trying to clear, the quality that they have to show, the consistency that they have to show, and that's what we try and build into these development loans.”
Silva is starting matches for Las Palmas in Spain and got off the mark with his first goal against Villarreal recently. It’s the Portuguese’s fourth loan spell away, following time at Anderlecht, PSV and Rangers, and a new country will provide fresh challenges, Jackson believes.
“I’m pleased for him. Fabio had options throughout the summer, but nothing that he particularly liked. It's going to be a challenge, but he's gone to a great league. We know how good that can be from a development perspective, but he's gone to a team that, at the moment, is struggling. Now he's got to spearhead that attack, find a way to score in a team that maybe isn't going to create a whole load of chances for him, and it's going to be tough.
“People forget how young he still is. Going through to next summer, he's got the European Championship, still under-21s. That shows the tender age he has. Of course, there's a massive expectation around him, and he's been away from the club a lot. But again, he's just got to define his own level.
“He's got such a desire to be a player, he works so hard, loves the game and loves scoring goals. He has had a real willingness to differentiate between the places he's gone. When you look at the loans that he's had, he's gone to big profile clubs, but they've all taught him something different. Mixed reviews in some cases, but that's part of the learning that the boys have to go through.”
Following a successful 18-month stint with Stoke City in the Championship, Hoever headed to Ligue 1 and Auxerre for a fresh challenge this summer and has quickly cemented his place in the team, hopefully paving the way for a successful loan.
“It’s a similar situation to Fabio. Two players that we've seen a lot, we’ve invested a lot in, and now we're just trying to get the very best that we can from them. That's the balance that we always have. We have to have a commercial eye on these things as well.
“But Ki-Jana plays a lot of football, plays a lot of minutes in a great league over there in France. It'll be a really good test for him, a different test. We know he can do it in the Championship easily, but going to Auxerre, he's going to get some really good tests over there.”
