Beleaguered Wolves boss Gary O’Neil pledged to fight on after a 4-0 thrashing at Everton that left travelling fans demanding his sacking.
O’Neil admitted his side had failed to compete with the Merseyside club as they conceded four goals for the second successive game and four or more for the fourth time in the Premier League this season.
They started badly as Ashley Young curled a free-kick around a poorly-placed Wolves wall and the evening got worse and Everton scored three times more and had two further goals disallowed.
“It’s basic stuff,” said O’Neil. “We can’t even get the wall in the right place. We weren’t able to cope with Everton’s physicality and long balls in the box.
“So there is an awful lot of work to be done to give the group a better chance in games coming next and try to find a way to give them more of a platform to have a chance.
“Bournemouth are a pressing team and we couldn’t cope with that. Everton are a physical team and we didn’t cope with that.
“So there’s an awful lot that we need to get into to try to find a way to give this team more of a chance on a consistent basis.”
Travelling fans sang “you’re getting sacked in the morning,” “you don’t know what you’re doing” and “your football is s***” towards O’Neil as weeks of simmering frustration erupted.
O’Neil was also booed when he walked towards Wolves fans to acknowledge their support after the final whistle.
“We get back to work as soon as I’ve finished this press conference on being ready to fight again on Monday because that’s where I need to get to with the group,” he said.
“For whatever reason at this moment, we cannot get this group to a point consistently that it can compete at this sort of level so we have to find a way, we have to find a way to give the group a better chance on, on Monday night at West Ham.
“I appreciate every single one of the Wolves fan base because they’ve given me unbelievable support since I arrived at the football club.
“In a tough moment, we managed to produce some unbelievable stuff last season away at Stamford Bridge, away at Tottenham, away at our rivals West Brom with a team that was obviously heavily tipped by most of the nation for relegation.
“We were nowhere near it ever and we managed to enjoy all of that together. So now that it’s tough, I’m happy to go over there and look them right in the face and take any criticism that they want to throw at me because I accept responsibility for all of my part in that.
“There’s a lot of parts that have led to where we are at this moment but for my part in that, I’m happy to accept full responsibility.
“I will back myself in any role given to get the most out of the group. I understand the drive for change from the supporters.
“You never know how many of them there are or what percentage it is because the negative noise is normally the loudest but I understand fully how they feel.
“The playing group is still together and I still have a lot of things that we can try to do with this group to try to give it a better chance than it had this evening.”
(Alex Livesey/Getty Images)
