Wolves chairman Jeff Shi makes summer transfer admission

Shi has come under criticism for Wolves' season ticket price rises, which has led to the chairman being inundated with emails from unhappy supporters.

The chairman has replied to a number of emails and many of his responses have been posted on social media.

His interaction with one fan saw Shi discuss Wolves' difficulty in signing forwards following Raul Jimenez's fractured skull injury and the chairman has insisted Wolves will address the lack of the strikers when the transfer window reopens.

"I personally think our current squad is better than the one in 2018-2020," Shi said.

"In the Premier League there are around 10-14 clubs at a similar level, the position in the table depends on a lot of factors but it's not the only criteria to judge a team's competitiveness.

"We miss Raul so much. I admit the peak Raul is a player who is very hard to replace, at this position we struggled to find a top one after his unfortunate injury."

He added: "We are going to sign one or two number nines this summer. The peak Raul was a top three striker in the league, which is really hard to replace. We did struggle on recruitment in the past few years.

"Hopefully the new strikers or Hee-chan can perform well next season."

Among many criticisms of the season ticket prices, fans were angry that the most expensive ticket at Molineux is £29 more expensive than the most expensive seat at Villa Park, for a team playing Champions League football in 2024/25.

However, Shi was adamant that Villa's average prices are more expensive and said Wolves could freeze tickets next year after making this big price hike to catch up to their competitors.

"Our season ticket price for the coming season is surely lower than that of Aston Villa," he said.

"They did a similar price hike in 2023, currently still charge higher than our new price.

"Our new price will be higher than Crystal Palace. I believe both our stadium and sporting achievement are better. They are based in London but in an area less affluent.

"This is a one-off adjustment to catch up with our peers and next season the price will either be frozen or increased just slightly."

Shi added: "We benchmark with other clubs by different stands and seating areas. Aston Villa's average price is definitely higher than ours."

Supporters are also angry that Molineux redevelopment has been on hold for a number of years after Covid, while the stadium is in desperate need of being repainted.

The chairman admits Molineux needs work doing on it and they are working to find a solution.

Shi said: "Molineux is tired. We've not found a sound financial solution to rebuild a stand but we never stop searching for it.

"What we can do now is to improve a bit here and there every year. Painting is one of the topics I am discussing with the team at the moment.

"But I've been to a lot of away stadia, tiredness is a common problem for almost each one.

"Many of them are no better than Molineux. Molineux has it's own good elements and some of them are still excellent."