The many faces of Matheus Cunha, the hero and villain of Wolves’ season

Will the real Matheus Cunha please stand up?

Is the Wolverhampton Wanderers forward the man who moved Premier League legend Ian Wright to tears last week with a touching visit to a poorly young fan and the goal celebration that it inspired?

Is Cunha the figure portrayed in a 34-minute ‘day in the life’ video published by the club last week showing him as the heart and soul of the team and the dressing room?

Is he the footballing genius behind the goal-of-the-season contender that helped his side take an FA Cup fifth-round tie on Saturday to penalties despite them being second-best for most of the afternoon?

Or is he the volatile figure who, later in the same game, lost his head for the second time in a few short months, damaged his side’s chances of reaching a second successive quarter-final with the season’s most inevitable red card and landed himself with a (minimum) three-match ban that could yet have even greater consequences for the club?

The truth is that, right now, Cunha is all of the above. The question is whether Vitor Pereira, Cunha’s team-mates and Wolves’ fans simply have to live with all of their talisman’s multiple personalities, or whether they have a right to demand better.

“I’m very grateful to everyone in the past in my life that led me,” says Cunha in the club’s YouTube production when asked about his recently new-found status as a leader within the club.

“From these guys, I learned a bit and I am still finding my way to lead the other guys because this is something a lot of people were born with but I still want to learn.

“I have a big friendship with a lot of these guys but these sort of things are still a privilege to be one of the guys, to help the other guys.

“If you help other people it is something amazing because I remember the people that helped me and I want to be more than a leader, I want to be someone that helps people.”

There have been many times this season that Cunha has helped Wolves immensely, but when he says he is still learning to lead, he is not kidding.

Without his 15 goals in all competitions, including one direct from a corner and Saturday’s stunning strike from 25 yards, it is safe to assume that Wolves would be in desperate trouble at the foot of the Premier League — instead of hovering above the bottom three as favourites to win the three-horse race to avoid the two relegation spots that are realistically still to be settled.

And the fly-on-the-wall Wolves video shows his influence off the field, too, with the Brazil international shown in warm exchanges with team-mates including Emmanuel Agbadou, Matt Doherty, Toti, Joao Gomes and Dan Bentley among others, plus backroom staff including hugs for chefs and kitmen.

His is often the loudest, most influential voice in the room and on the field, laughing, cajoling and at one moment heckling the goalkeepers during a training drill, and there is little doubt that within the walls of the club’s Compton Park training ground he is loved and respected.

His heart-warming exchanges with Junior, the young Wolves fan with cancer, shows a naturally warm, endearing personality. Cunha’s rapport with Junior is uplifting and genuine.

That, combined with footage of Cunha with his own wife and child at their home in Tettenhall, also leave little question that he is a hugely likeable character.

Those who played a part in Cunha’s upbringing would not recognise the volatile side of his nature that has shown itself too often this season.

In fact Eric Lovey — the former agent who orchestrated Cunha’s move from Brazil to Sion in Switzerland as a teenager — did so based purely on the player’s personality.

“When I was in Coritiba and he was 17 I went to watch a game,” Lovey told The Athletic in an interview conducted before Cunha’s two outbursts this season.

“He didn’t play a very good game, but afterwards I went for a coffee with him. After 15 minutes I saw such maturity in him that could be a big player.

“I said to my friend, the president of Sion, ‘I don’t have a video or a DVD, he’s not on Transfermarkt, he is nothing’.

“I told him he had the possibility to believe in me, and he paid 200,000 dollars to sign him, but when he signed him he didn’t know anything about him.

“He had never played as a professional but in the coffee afterwards I was so impressed with his personality.”

Cunha is a popular figure with Wolves’ supporters (Alex Pantling/Getty Images)

Sandro Forner, who coached Cunha at his first club, Coritiba, echoes Lovey’s words of praise. “He was always a very good person and a very intelligent person,” said Forner, also speaking before Cunha’s two big indiscretions.

“As a younger player he always asked me very intelligent questions about how he should make decisions during the game.”

None of that, though, excuses Saturday’s outburst. Pereira mitigated the red card for striking, kicking and then headbutting Bournemouth’s Milos Kerkez by pointing to the emotion of the afternoon and Cunha’s frustration, exacerbated by a niggling hamstring issue that is making games harder.

All of that might be easier to accept if this was Cunha’s first indiscretion of the season. It was not.

There was the stroppy display in defeat at Chelsea that led to Pereira publicly rebuking his striker for his petulant body language — one of a few occasions during the campaign with Cunha has worn his heart on his sleeve a little too much.

And, while Cunha had not been sent off before Saturday during his time in Germany, Spain or England, most famously there were the post-match scenes following December’s defeat by Ipswich Town in which Cunha inexplicably elbowed a member of Ipswich’s staff in the head before removing his glasses in an outburst that would have been vaguely comical had it not been so angry.

Cunha is sent off in extra-time at the Vitality Stadium (Ryan Pierse/Getty Images)

Speaking about that incident, which occurred a few days before his appointment, Pereira told a press conference: “He knows it was not a good reaction but I look for a player not only as a player, but as a human being and even me, I make mistakes.

”He knows he made a mistake, he knows not to do it again and to keep the emotional balance and move forward.” On the evidence of Saturday, lessons have not been sufficiently learned.

A week earlier, captain Nelson Semedo was waxing lyrical about Cunha following another goal at Bournemouth that sealed a vital Premier League win.

“Matheus is a very important player for us, one of the best players in the league,” Semedo told reporters. “We’re very lucky to have him.”

And there was no doubt that Semedo’s sentiments were heartfelt. Cunha has become Wolves’ talisman, which explains why he was handed a new contract just a few weeks ago.

The incident with the pair of glasses against Ipswich (Carl Recine/Getty Images)

The new deal did little to improve Wolves’ position, given it included a summer release clause that makes it likely Cunha will depart for a fee that he would probably have commanded in any event, given his previous deal had two years remaining.

But it did help Cunha with an improved salary and extra security as reward for his massive contribution and incentive to maintain it in a world where players’ heads are often turned.

Simply, Wolves are giving him a slab of extra cash they did not need to, to keep him happy and focused.

In return, they have a right to demand that he keeps a few of his many character traits, some endearing, some inspiring, some infuriating, under control.

(Header photos: Getty Images)