Wolverhampton Wanderers striker Rafa Mir has admitted his time at the club has not gone how he would have liked.
The youngster arrived at Molineux in a £1.8m deal from Valencia in 2018, with manager Nuno Espirito Santo reuniting with a player who enjoyed his debut under him at the Mestalla.
His time at the club has been difficult, though, with him managing just five appearances in total for Wolves since his arrival and no goals in any of them.
He has instead spent the last two years out on loan with the likes of Las Palmas, Nottingham Forest and Huesca.
That last spell proved to be a successful one last year, with the striker returning from Wolves this year in another loan deal, this time with an option to make it permanent.
The Spanish side will likely be keen to activate that if he manages to replicate the form from the second half of last season, bringing an end to a disappointing spell in England.
And now the 23-year-old has admitted that he found living in England difficult, although he is grateful to have spent time there nonetheless.
“It is true that Nuno was key in my signing for Wolves and in that path that I took for English football,” he told Plaza Deportiva.
“Things have not gone as I wanted there; it is a complicated place and very different from what we are used to.
“In the end, you can say that Nuno is important in my career… but not that much.
“It is difficult to live there, and, as I said, things have not turned out as I expected. I have not been as happy as I would have liked.
“On a sporting level, it is true that it has made me grow a lot, sportingly and personally. I am grateful to have passed through there.”
Disappointment is something Mir has had to deal with a lot in his career so far, particularly after his debut for Valencia.
The youngster was thrown into the deep end by Espirito Santo, making his professional start in a crucial Champions League clash with FC Zenit Saint Petersburg.
He lasted just 56 minutes in that game, which Valencia eventually lost 2-0, with the Valencia boss receiving plenty of criticism as a result.
Some of that came about because it was claimed the decision was influenced by Jorge Mendes, who was also Mir’s agent at the time. The striker, though, says he was confused by the reaction.
“I didn’t quite understand them (the critics),” he added.
“I had been in the club for three or four years. They were criticisms that, well, yes, my representative was Mendes, but then Nuno lasted a week in office.
“I stayed in between, I went down to the youth level again, which is where it all started…
“It was a complicated situation, but I take it as an experience. I also remember that fondly.”
