With Walter Zenga’s Wolverhampton Wanderers having followed up their first back-to-back league wins of the campaign with their first consecutive losses prior to the international break, the fiery Italian will be hoping that a new-look strike force can help to ensure greater consistency in the coming weeks, starting with Saturday evening’s mouth-watering clash with Midlands rivals Aston Villa.
Having recently made his first-team return after more than a year out of action with a horrific ACL injury, Wanderers hitman Nouha Dicko, speaking to the Express & Star, revealed his excitement at the prospect of forming a prolific partnership with Icelandic International Jon Dadi Bodvarsson, who should make his own return to action on Saturday evening, having missed Wolves’ 2-1 losses to Wigan Athletic and Norwich City with a troublesome groin injury.
“From what I’ve seen from him he’s a really good player and a good team player.” Dicko began.
“He makes a big difference to the team. I think it’s not only me, it’s the whole team that likes to play with him, and I’ll be the same.”
The Wolves fans that make the short trip to Villa Park this weekend could well be rewarded by seeing the two forwards appear together for the very first time, a prospect that has all Wanderers supporters licking their lips, and with good reason.
Bodvarsson, despite having only netted twice in his short time at Molineux thus far, has proven to be a key component in Zenga’s side, with Wolves having not won any of the three league games in which the Icelandic battering-ram has not started his season. His importance to the current Wolves set-up is comparable to that of Nouha Dicko during Kenny Jackett’s Molineux reign, with Dicko’s year-long absence seeing Wanderers finish a miserable campaign in 14th place, just a year after amassing the highest points tally ever recorded by a side to miss out on the second-tier playoffs, when, as part of a three-pronged strike force along with Bakary Sako and Benik Afobe, Dicko played a vital role in the Molineux men winning a massive 78 points upon their return to the Championship.
Even during that outstanding 2014/15 campaign, Wanderers were somewhat reliant on Dicko to spearhead their attacking efforts, falling to 5 successive losses in the Winter during his absence, this time caused by a problematic hamstring injury. Heavy defeats suffered at the hands of Derby County and Brentford during this time ultimately proved costly in their late attempt to gate-crash the top six, while the Malian frontman’s year-long layoff last term was undoubtedly a key factor in the toothless displays that alienated so many of a gold and black persuasion.
Yet despite this season’s inconsistent results, the Chinese-takeover of the club in July has certainly bought excitement back to the Molineux masses, excitement that will only be amplified further should Zenga hand starts to both Bodvarsson and Dicko, scorer of 28 goals in his first 18 months at the club, at Villa Park on Saturday. The time has come for Zenga’s new-look squad to step up and begin to cultivate a winning mentality, and should they be able to hit top form, a partnership between these two Molineux cult heroes can only further Wolverhampton Wanderers’ promotion aspirations.
