Vitor Pereira is confident that Wolves can kickstart their 2025-26 Premier League campaign with a victory against Manchester City following their summer rebuild.
After guiding Wolves to safety last season, Pereira has overseen a period of change which has seen many of his top performers leave for new pastures.
Top scorer Matheus Cunha has joined Manchester United, while Rayan Ait-Nouri has linked up with Pep Guardiola at Manchester City.
Goncalo Guedes, Nelson Semedo, Chiquinho and Pablo Sarabia have also left the club on free transfers, though Wolves have brought in four new faces to Molineux.
And Pereira has plenty of belief in his current squad and explained how creating a new team and putting his own identity onto it is one of his favourite things to do as a manager.
“I’m positive, and I’m excited because this is the best league in the world, and, for me, it’s a pleasure to be here. In football, each season is a new season,” Pereira said.
“You always need to reinvent yourself because we’ll face different challenges. We need to rebuild our identity, to reinforce our identity, and this will take some time.
“We have some new players and I’m expecting another one or two or three, and the club is working on that, so we’ll see, as I cannot say now that we are at our best level, we still need to have time for this.
“But this is the magic that I need in my life to work; to create every time, to express my creativity because I like to create new things.
“For me, each season is a chance for me to create, to rebuild and to express myself so I can help my team. This is the butterflies and the passion that I feel.”
— Wolves (@Wolves) August 9, 2025
Man City have also seen a number of new players arrive at the Etihad Stadium, headlined by the £46.5m (€53.7m) capture of Tijjani Reijnders from AC Milan.
They have also welcomed Ait-Nouri, Rayan Cherki, James Trafford, Sverre Nypan and Marcus Bettinelli, though it is one member that has been at the club since 2016 that Pep Guardiola believes will be key to their success this season.
John Stones, who has won 15 trophies with the Citizens, played just 20 times for City across all competitions in 2024-25 after being hampered by foot and hamstring injuries.
The 31-year-old has been a major part of City’s success under Guardiola, and the Spaniard believes he will have an important part to play for his team, should he stay fit.
“Massively,” said Guardiola when quizzed about the importance of having Stones fit. “In the years of the Treble and quadruple, John Stones was massively important for us.
“He is a top class player but last season he played less than 30 per cent of the games for us. He was injured a lot of times.
“What we want is for him to be fit. He didn’t play much in the Club World Cup. He played the first 45 minutes here, and it’s step by step because we need him.
“We have good central defenders, but we need him.”
PLAYERS TO WATCH
Wolves – Jhon Arias
Arias’ impressive displays at the Club World Cup for Fluminense earned him a move to the Premier League, with the Colombian creating more chances (18) than any other player at the recent tournament in the United States.
He also played 100 passes that ended in the final third, a total only bettered by Nicolo Barella (109), Aleksandar Pavlovic (121), Joshua Kimmich, Achraf Hakimi (both 162) and Vitinha (164), and will be looking to make his mark against Guardiola’s side.
Man City – Rayan Cherki
Guardiola has welcomed six new faces into his squad for the 2025-26 campaign, but none look as exciting as £36m (€41.6m) midfielder Cherki.
Indeed, no player provided more assists in Ligue 1 last season than Cherki (11). He was also involved in 13 goals in his last 15 league appearances for Lyon (five goals, eight assists).
MATCH PREDICTION: MAN CITY WIN
The Citizens have won their opening league game in 13 of the last 14 seasons, with the exception being a 1-0 loss at Tottenham in 2021-22.
City have also made a habit of starting the season strongly. They have lost just one of their last 31 Premier League games in August (W26 D4), triumphing in their last eight games during the month by an aggregate score of 25-5.
And they have often enjoyed trips to the West Midlands. Across the last five Premier League campaigns, Guardiola’s side have won the joint-most games (four) and scored the most goals (14) of any side when facing Wolves at Molineux (W4 D0 L1 F14 A5).
Wolves, meanwhile, have lost nine of their last 10 Premier League meetings with City (W1), although their one victory in this period did come at Molineux early in the season, winning 2-1 in September 2023 under Gary O’Neil.
Having been unbeaten in their opening league match in eight consecutive campaigns between 2013-14 and 2020-21 (W4 D4), Wolves have lost their first game of a new season in each of the last four years, and they will be aiming for a positive result this time around.
They also stumbled to a 16th-place finish in 2024-25. After a six-game winning run in March and April, Wolves failed to win any of their final four Premier League games of 2024-25 (D1 L3).
OPTA WIN PROBABILITY
Wolves – 17.1%
Draw – 21.1%
Man City – 61.8%
