Wolves Sack Rob Edwards as Cesar Peixoto Set to Take Over

Wolverhampton Wanderers have sacked Rob Edwards in a brutal twist just weeks before the new season, with Portuguese coach Cesar Peixoto poised to take over at Molineux.

Edwards was informed of the decision by the club’s hierarchy despite having been central to a summer rebuild that delivered marquee signings Kieran Trippier and Raúl Jiménez. His fingerprints are all over the recruitment, but not, it seems, over the future.

Peixoto, represented by the Jorge Mendes-owned Gestifute agency, is now on the brink of being appointed. The 44-year-old has coached only in Portugal, most notably at Gil Vicente, yet finds himself on the verge of stepping into one of English football’s most volatile dugouts.

This is a club still reeling from last season. Wolves finished bottom of the Premier League, a campaign that saw Vitor Pereira sacked in November and Edwards brought in with a clear understanding: relegation was likely, the real job would begin in the Championship.

Wolves paid a premium to make that happen. Middlesbrough, who were top of the Championship at the time, received £4 million in compensation to release Edwards for the Molineux project. He arrived as the man to steady the ship, reshape the squad and lead a reset.

Now that project has been ripped up before a ball is kicked.

The timing jars with everything Wolves have projected over the past few weeks. The club has been riding a wave of optimism after landing Trippier and Jiménez, two established names who were sold on a vision that, crucially, included Edwards at the heart of it.

Inside the building, Edwards had forged a strong partnership with technical director Matt Jackson. Together they had targeted British talent this summer, a deliberate strategy to strengthen the home-grown core of the squad and address the club’s domestic quota.

There were visible signs of that cultural shift. Edwards featured prominently in Jiménez’s “Welcome Home” announcement video on the club’s social media just two days ago, a clear nod to his role as the face of the rebuild. Trippier, in his first club interview released on Wednesday, spoke openly about how Edwards’ presence had been a major factor in his decision to join. Players, staff, and insiders talked of a new tone at Compton: tighter standards, clearer communication, a manager who was starting to reshape the dressing room.

Yet while that new culture was being rolled out in public, a different process was unfolding in private.

Behind the scenes, Mendes and his associate Valdir Cardoso were working on a deal to bring in Peixoto. The pair have maintained strong ties with Wolves’ owners, Fosun, ever since the Chinese conglomerate completed its takeover in 2016. Those connections have defined much of the club’s modern era, from the early surge under Nuno Espírito Santo to the steady stream of Gestifute clients who have passed through Molineux.

That influence has now cut across the Edwards project. The decision to move for Peixoto, taken before the new Championship campaign has even started, risks shattering the fragile positivity that had just begun to return around the club.

For the players who signed for Edwards, and the staff who bought into his reset, the message is stark: at Wolves, the real power lines still run elsewhere.