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Josh Esen has signed a contract extension with Wolverhampton Wanderers, little over seven months after penning his first professional deal at the club.
This extension will see Esen remain with the old gold until at least the summer of 2026, with the option of a further year in place.
Esen is in his second season at Wolves after joining as a 16-year-old from Llanelli Town in September 2021, following a successful trial period at Compton Park.
The youngster, now 18 and formerly of Swansea City, quickly adapted to life in the Midlands and became an integral member of the under-18s squad who reached the FA Youth Cup semi-final last season.
Esen was rewarded with his first professional contract as recently as last August and has since go on to appear for the under-21s in league and cup competitions.
Academy manager for football, Jon Hunter-Barrett, has praised the maturity shown by Esen, who has continued to perform for the under-18s while getting his taste of action higher up with the 21s, assisting and scoring in recent games.
“Josh has shown excellent maturity because whilst others have gone into the under-21 environment full-time, Josh has had more of a hybrid approach.”
“He continued to play for the 18s while training with the 21s. It proved that it worked quite well because he was getting lots of practice, scoring goals and impacting games in the 18s.”
“Now that he’s had an opportunity to go into the 21s games, his performances have matched and he’s been exciting.”
Hunter-Barrett has also been impressed with Esen’s off-field attitude, where his ability to adapt to a new environment away from home has been the catalyst for him to be successful on the pitch.
“Josh did have an early academy experience at Swansea but fell away,” Hunter-Barrett continued. “He went away and worked hard, before getting picked up by us and came into our environment.”
“It’s never easy living away from home and all the other things that are attached to that situation, but he’s done really well and is settling down. He’s starting to really physically develop into a really good stature and presence on the football pitch.”
“This is the start of it now, in terms of showing people what he can do at that level. The next stage now is to sustain it and continue to perform the way he’s been performing going into the new season.”
