Matt Doherty says this season it’s felt like he never left Molineux, after an enjoyable first campaign back in the West Midlands.
After making more than 300 appearances during his first spell with the club, Doherty spent three years at Tottenham Hotspur and Atletico Madrid, before arriving at a crossroads last summer.
The path he took was a return to the West Midlands, where his versatility and dependability has been crucial for Gary O’Neil, who turned to the 32-year-old 37 times last season, on both the right and the left, and it’s contributed to a positive first season back in familiar surroundings.
On being back at Wolves
“It’s been enjoyable in the most part. Obviously, you want to contribute a bit more – everybody will always say they wish they could contribute a bit more – but the place is so familiar to me. I came back and it felt like I’d never left. I’ve really enjoyed it and we’ve done well as a team for the most part. As long as the team’s doing well, everything always feels that little bit better.
“It was almost as if I’d never left when I came back. I know I’d been gone for three years, but it didn’t feel like that. Coming back makes things easier, the same faces, not necessarily on the playing staff, but the staff around Compton and Molineux, with still a few players who were here before. It was pretty comfortable.”
On more minutes since Christmas
“When you’re not playing, you obviously don’t enjoy it as much as when you’re playing. When you’re playing, everything seems fine. When you play and win, the rest of your week seems to feel better than if you don’t play and if you’re maybe a bit annoyed, you’ll stay annoyed for the week. It does change your mood completely, but I feel good. First half of the season I wanted to do more, but it wasn’t the way it was, but it’s turned around a bit for me.”
On his favourite games of spell two
“West Brom was a good game. None of us had every played against them. West Brom was fun, you want to play in a big derby like that. It doesn’t matter if they’re not a Premier League team, you still want to play in that type of game, so that was fun away from home. Games like that always feel a bit better when you win away from home, in front of their fans. That was good for the fans as well.
“It was pretty good when we played Tottenham and scored two goals in the last minute, and you happen to be on the pitch for that. Not because I played them before or anything like that – it could have been against anybody – but coming back and scoring two goals in the last second, doing it so late, it’s good.”
On thinking back to his first spell
“The first time around, the team we had, the environment, the feeling around the whole club, the whole city, it was completely different feeling. We had a lot of players at the perfect age, all flying and playing well at the same time. We had Nuno in charge, and it was like a perfect storm, everything just clicked for everybody.”
