Wolverhampton Wanderers striker Sasa Kalajdzic has admitted that a fear of relegation has stopped them from playing to their best this season.
The Austrian striker has been speaking to Sky Sports Austria about Wolves campaign so far, which has seen them flirting with relegation for much of the campaign.
They appeared to be deep in relegation trouble earlier in the season but have been transformed since Julen Lopetegui arrived to replace Bruno Lage at the beginning of November.
He has since steadied the ship considerably, with Wolves now 13th in the table and nine points clear of the relegation zone, with a win over Aston Villa at the beginning of the month assuring their Premier League status.
Kalajdzic is certainly impressed by what he’s seen behind the scenes insisting it was simply a fear of the drop that stopped Wolves from realising their potential this year.
“We are a team with so much potential. If you’ve been in a relegation place all the time, you can never reach your full potential because you don’t bring that self-confidence to the pitch,” he said.
“I was in the same situation in Stuttgart in my last season. You have so many players with so much potential who want to show that but you’re also just afraid that your mistakes will be punished directly, especially in a relegation battle.
“I think that’s what happened throughout the year, how can we really exploit our potential when there’s a bit of fear that we’ll lose. The coaching changes also bring uncertainty.
“Since Lopetegui has been here they’ve done really well. There have been narrow victories but there have also been narrow defeats. I don’t think we deserved to be in a relegation place.”
