GRILLER WARFARE

Foody Lopetegui, football manager and restaurateur, is hungry to drive Wolves up the table ... just don’t ask him to cook the steaks!

IN his first season at Wolves, Julen Lopetegui served up Premier League survival.

Now the manager – and restaurant owner – wants to know what ingredients he can work with next term as he aims to put more ambitious dishes on the Molineux menu.

After arriving in November with Wolves bottom of the top-flight, finishing 13th was tasty for fans despite a couple of unappetising away defeats once safety was secured, including a 5-0 reverse at Arsenal on Sunday.

Over a glass of smooth red wine at Wolves’ training ground, the Spaniard revealed how he is hungry to compete higher up the table as he opened up on his passion for football and food.

Food and sport were in the blood after growing up in his family restaurant in Spain where he often had to work the grill as a teenager.

It was demanding, hot work in his hometown of Asteasu, in the Basque Country up north.

Once Lopetegui even had a week’s pay docked when he burnt dozens of steaks after nipping outside for a kick around with pals. Former goalkeeper Lopetegui, 56, who now has a restaurant of his own in Madrid, smiled: “I was the black sheep of the family, it is true. I always dreamed I can become a player.

“My family owned a restaurant and me, my father, my mother, all my brothers, my aunty, all of us worked at different times.

“If you wanted to play football, first you had to finish your homework – not school work – in the restaurant.

“My favourite memory was managing the grill. I love to grill, believe me I am a master.

“But I remember one day the restaurant was full of people so we had maybe 25 steaks grilling over the flames.

“A friend of mine came with a ball. My job was to attend the flames on the grill.

“I’m looking after the fire and saying, ‘It will be OK’. For a few seconds, I’ll play football but it was more like 10 minutes and the steaks all went on fire!

“It was the equivalent of one week’s wages – all gone. It was my fault, can you imagine?”

But the incident did not put Lopetegui off his love of food. “I prefer to spend my money on good meat rather than good clothes or a good car,” he said.

There is a steel to Lopetegui (right and above left), too.

Just ask Nottingham Forest after stormy clashes in both the Carabao Cup and top flight (both matches, below right) saw the clubs fined.

Lopetegui said: “Sometimes when I see myself I don’t like me. I think, ‘He is crazy, he is mad’. But the next match I am the same – sorry, it is me.

“I try to be honest and direct with the players and don’t ever lie. All these codes in the dressing room are important.”

Lopetegui has “forbidden” his son from following him into management however.

Daniel Lopetegui, who is studying in London, is instead an analyst assisting Wolves’ sporting director Matt Hobbs, while his daughter is a keen pianist who introduced her father to the instrument, too.

Lopetegui added: “When I want to be alone, I like to play piano.”

Now Wolves fans hope he will continue to hit the right notes next season despite concerns over Ruben Neves’ likely sale and their spending power amid Financial Fair Play issues.