How Wolves snapped up £21m star who 'nearly signed' for Liverpool

Wolves sporting director Matt Hobbs has revealed just how the club managed to secure the services of Brazilian international Andre amid interest from a host of top teams.

It was a marquee deal just ahead of the summer transfer deadline as Wanderers had very little funds to splash but decided Andre was worth the £21 million investment. Centre-back was an area Wolves definitely needed more but the club just couldn’t turn down the opportunity of bring in someone of Andre’s calibre.

Hobbs has confirmed there was another Premier League side working on a deal but Wolves hijacked, not bearing the thought of seeing the player come up against them. “He came in towards the end (of the transfer window) but he’s a player we’ve been working on for probably 18 months,” Hobbs told BBC Radio 5 Live.

“I thought he was going to play for someone else and I called his agent and said, ‘no, he can’t play for someone else’. We had to find a way because we couldn’t have him playing against us in the Premier League.

“It’s enabled us to tweak things slightly, going into a three in the middle of the pitch. I think for us it’s about developing different ways of playing and coming up with different answers because the Premier League is incredibly tough. As a recruitment team we have to keep finding good players,” Hobbs continued.

The identity of the club Wolves ended up beating to Andre is unknown but Fulham had been in talks and Liverpool were close to signing the Brazilian in 2023. ESPN reported last December that the Reds had ‘come calling’ for Andre that summer as Jurgen Klopp saw him as a perfect option to help rebuild in midfield.

It turns out, however, that Andre turned down the opportunity as he wanted to stay with Fluminense for a while longer. The now 23-year-old went on to win the highly-esteemed Copa Libertadores, so it wasn’t exactly a bad decision. And he eventually got his move to the Premier League anyway, with Wolves taking their recent punt.