Wolves boss Vitor Pereira has urged the club to secure Nelson Semedo’s future and praised the defender’s impact since taking over the captaincy.

Semedo is out of contract this summer, but Pereira wants to sort out a new deal for the 31-year-old, who replaced Mario Lemina as captain in the final days of Gary O’Neil’s tenure. Pereira insisted he had made no final decision on a permanent club captain but added that Semedo had done everything required of him in the role.

“Nelson is a very good captain for us,” Pereira said. “He’s working hard, he’s giving the example to the others and he is trying to help the team. He’s a very good example for us to have as a captain.

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“Because I have time, I’m finding the personalities that I want as leaders in the team. At the moment, I’m not changing the captain and I’m okay with him, but I’m studying the personalities and I need some time for that.

“He’s a good player, he’s professional, he has the skills that I like, so it means that if the club was to ask my opinion, I would want to stay with him.

“There have been no discussions because there have been a lot of things to fix and to work on, so it’s difficult for me to think about everything. But we will have time to sit down and discuss.”

Pereira also said he wants to use the January window to strengthen a Wolves squad that is short on numbers and insisted he cannot allow any first-team departures due to the lack of depth.

“We have a short squad and we don’t have a lot of solutions for each position and it means that we need to keep the players and to bring one or two players to help us and to bring different solutions,” he said.

“It’s not the time to start sending the players out, but we need to have a balance in this. I know the month of January, when the market is open, every team will have happy players and some players that want to play more and have more of a chance to play.

“We understand everything, but in this moment, we need to think about the team and about ourselves. We need everyone.”

Lemina and Pablo Sarabia, yet to feature for Pereira due to injury, have returned to training but may not be fit in time for Monday’s game against Nottingham Forest.

Andre has also been absent from training this week but could yet feature after returning home to Brazil for the birth of his child.

“Andre is not a problem for us,” Pereira said. “He’s not here because his son has been born in Brazil and a father must be with his son and with his wife. This is a moment that I cannot say, ‘No, you cannot’. This is a commitment between him and me. As part of this commitment is that he must come back for the game.”

Wolves go into Monday's game one point clear of the drop zone in 17th, while Forest are riding high in third place.