Phil Hayward
Head of High Performance, Wolverhampton Wanderers FC
Phil has vast experience as a leader in elite sport having spent 19 years in football, tennis and rugby. He started his career at Bradford Bulls before transitioning into football, initially at Bolton Wanderers before moving to Wolverhampton Wanderers in 2008. Phil progressed from Head of Academy Medical to become Head of Medical Services in 2012.
After 8 years as Head of Medical Services, Phil made the switch to the USA and Major League Soccer, becoming Director of High Performance at the most successful club in US soccer history, LA Galaxy. During this time he oversaw dramatic change across the performance and medical areas and sat on the MLS working group as the league became the first in professional sport to return to competition during the Covid pandemic, helping develop protocols for the MLS Is Back ‘bubble’ – a 6 week long residential tournament held in Orlando, FL.
After 2 years stateside, Phil returned to the UK and took up a role on the ATP Tour as performance physio for Sir Andy Murray, the greatest British tennis player of all time.
In January 2023, Phil returned to Wolves as Head of High Performance where he currently oversees all aspects of performance across Men’s, Women’s and Academy programmes.
Lessons learned from The ATP Tour
Lessons learned from the ATP Tour: A talk providing insight into life as a physio on the ATP tour with some detailed reflections and learnings from my time working with Andy Murray. How my 16 years of previous work in football helped me give a different perspective to Andy and how now, on returning to football, my work and approach has evolved as a result of experiences at the cutting edge of elite Tennis.