Wolverhampton Wanderers' managing director Laurie Dalrymple has said that he believes the club are close to challenging for promotion to the Premier League.

The Midlands side were taken over last summer by wealthy Chinese conglomerate Fosun International, who immediately replaced manager Kenny Jackett with Walter Zenga and signed up 13 new players.

With the club struggling in the league, however, Zenga was replaced by experienced Championship manager Paul Lambert after just three months.

Wolves have now won six of their last 10 matches - including away FA Cup wins at Stoke City and Liverpool - but still sit 14 points off the playoffs, making promotion this season an unlikely feat.

"Regardless of where we finish this season, whether we sneak into the playoffs, or 10th, or wherever, the key thing is how we finish the season and the momentum we can take," Dalrymple told the Express & Star. "Then picking that up and going for next season, with hopefully as limited an amount of squad development as possible.

"Where we are now is that we've started to turn a big corner in the past two months. To a degree I leave that decision making to Kevin [Thelwall, sporting director] in terms of the squad, the ability and the talent in the group, where the gaps are, etc. But from a financial point of view I'm not 100 per cent convinced we're that far away from having a squad that can challenge.

"I'm not sure it needs that level of investment [again]. It's something we'll start to evaluate in March and April so when we get to the summer we know where the gaps are and what we're going to have to put towards it from a financial point of view. The Financial Fair Play model has to influence what we do, so how we take the squad forward and develop it would be a discussion around outs as well as ins."

Wolves are about to embark upon a run of five consecutive home games, beginning with the visit of table-topping Newcastle United this Saturday.