Mick McCarthy stressed the importance of his Wolves players keeping calm as he prepares for another pressure-cooker match against Sunderland at Molineux on Sunday.
The Black Cats sacked manager Steve Bruce this week and are being strongly tipped to bring in Martin O'Neill as his replacement. McCarthy has also come under fire from sections of his own fans after a run of only one win in 11 games has seen Wolves plummet to the fringe of the relegation zone.
But he has tried to maintain an air of confidence and hopes that has rubbed off on his squad. McCarthy said: "All the time it has been a case of keeping calm after we had won two and drawn one of the first three games or when we lost seven out of nine."
He added: "I think it (keeping calm) is led from the top surely. If that is my attitude towards it, I think the players will follow my lead in most things.
"I think players take the lead from the manager. If I'm banging the table and chewing all the time, it will give them a problem. I'm not because I think we will get the points and we will play better."
McCarthy has seen his players respond to being 2-0 down to Swansea and recovering from being pegged back by Wigan to collect four points from their last two home games.
He hopes that experience will stand them in good stead against Sunderland and is not playing down the importance of the game.
McCarthy said: "One of the clubs has lost their manager so we can't dress this up as anything else than a really big, important game.
"It is huge, but then we beat Wigan and against Swansea we were poor and eked a point out of it. Now Sunderland are one of our nearest competitors.
"If there was no tension and excitement, and no-one was bothered, you lot (the media) wouldn't be here, and I wouldn't be talking here. It wouldn't be as exciting as it is and I love every minute of it."
Source: PA
