Gary O’Neil so impressed with rarely used £15m Wolves star’s professionalism

Gary O’Neil so impressed with rarely used £15m Wolves star’s professionalism

Gary O’Neil says defender Jonny Castro Otto is training ‘unbelievably hard’ every day and can still play a part for Wolves this season.

Jonny has not featured much at all so far this season. The Spaniard has so far made just three appearances across all competitions. The £15 million man played both of Wolves’ Carabao Cup games in full, but has made just one four-minute cameo in the Premier League.

Currently, he’s got Nelson Semedo, Matt Doherty, Rayan Ait-Nouri and Hugo Bueno all ahead of him in the pecking order at Molineux.

Despite struggling for minutes, Jonny has not let his standards drop. And O’Neil has really heaped praise on him for his professionalism…

Gary O’Neil really happy with Jonny Castro Otto despite hardly playing him for Wolves
O’Neil has been speaking about Jonny, who is one of the least-used players for Wolves so far this term.

The 29-year-old could perhaps be forgiven for being a little frustrated with his situation. But by the sounds of it, he is very low maintenance and a dream to manage.

O’Neil said (Express & Star): “He trains unbelievably hard every day, even when we don’t do a hard session and he always wants to do more. He understands where he is at this moment in time but that doesn’t affect his professionalism.

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“He’s important to me, he’s come on already and was incredibly close to coming on a couple of times before. He’s right there in my thoughts with the rest of them.

“I’ve been really impressed with how he works, how he approaches his work and how professional he is.”

O’Neil added that Jonny still has a part to play this season.

Right now though it is difficult for him, with Ait-Nouri and Semedo both in especially good form. Just last week, O’Neil said that ‘the sky’s the limit’ for Ait-Nouri, and he’s clearly a big fan of the youngster.

Fair play to Jonny, he’s clearly a brilliant pro

This is great to hear from O’Neil, about a player who reportedly turned down the chance to leave Wolves in the summer so he could stay and fight for his place.

Many players in football get disgruntled when they don’t play. And really, Jonny has now been on the fringes for quite a while at Wolves.

But he’s clearly a very professional player, and credit must go to him for being understanding of the situation.

It is very admirable that he stayed at the club to fight for his place. It hasn’t happened for him so far this season, but Wolves fans would no doubt love to see him make a strong push to become a starter again.

In his first year at Wolves, before his knee injuries, he was absolutely superb. Maybe it’s unlikely he’ll get back to that level again but if he doesn’t it will not be through a lack of desire or hard work