The Season Review: #SWFC

Stuart Gray, turned SWFC's fortunes around.

Given the start of the season, Sheffield Wednesday fans had the privilege of feeling safe weeks before the season ended rather than going through the roller-coaster of emotions on the final day of the season. Other South Yorkshire teams were less fortunate than Wednesday and the close of the season saw Barnsley and Doncaster Rovers relegated to League One in agonising style. Finishing with 53 points and nine points above the relegation zone, Sheffield Wednesday finished 16th in the league with 13 wins, 14 draws and 19 defeats and a goal difference of -2 with 63 goals for and 65 against.

 The season started with an encouraging 2-1 loss away to QPR with a fine Atdhe Nuhiu debut goal but then Sheffield Wednesday exited the League Cup at the first round, losing 2-1 at the NY Stadium to Rotherham United. That same scoreline saw Sheffield Wednesday's first home match against Burnley end in defeat before Wednesday were unlucky to come away with only a point from Elland Road following a 1-1 draw. August came to a close following two further draws for Wednesday as 2-2 at home to Millwall and then 1-1 away at Middlesbrough saw a win-less month end.

September was no less kind for Wednesday as they drew 1-1 with relegation favourites Yeovil (at Hillsborough) before being hammered 4-1 away at Birmingham with Manchester United loanee Jesse Lingard scoring all four goals. The final game of September was a one nil home defeat to Doncaster Rovers - a day which saw TheSWFCarmchairfan return to Hillsborough after a long absence (read about my day here). 

Disappointingly for the Owls the last clean sheet that was kept was the two nil win against Middlesbrough on the final day of last season and that didn't look like letting up any time soon as in October they conceded four more goals in the four games that they played. It was the month of the 1-1 draws as Brighton (a), Ipswich (h), Bolton (a) and Barnsley (h) all held the Owls. 

Chris Kirkland struggled for a clean sheet.

Growing unrest from the Hillsborough faithful was quickly silenced as in the next home game (against Reading), Sheffield Wednesday ran out 5-2 winners with goals coming from loanee Matty Fryatt (x2), Antonio, an own goal by Morrison and a debut goal for Connor Wickham. The renewed confidence was quickly washed away though as a three nil away defeat at Derby was followed by a 2-1 home loss to Huddersfield and a two nil away loss at Blackpool ending November disappointingly. 

December started with Sheffield Wednesday sacking manager Dave Jones and caretaker-manager Stuart Gray taking the hot seat. Gray got his tenure off to a great start by beating promotion favourites Leicester City 2-1 at Hillsborough before losing one nil in the next home game against Nottingham Forest with the solitary strike coming from Simon Cox. Finally the Owls got their first clean sheet of the season in a 0-1 away win at Watford before embarrassingly losing at home to Bournemouth and drawing the final two games of December 0-0 at Blackburn and 1-1 on the road at Charlton.

SWFC 6-0 Leeds United, result of the season?

The busy month of January started with a 2-0 win for Sheffield Wednesday over Blackpool at home before a disappointing 1-1 draw in the FA Cup third round to Macclesfield. The result of the season followed as a massive 6-0 hammering of Leeds United at Hillsborough gave the Owls bragging rights with goals from captain Reda Johnson, Nuhiu, Wickham, Maguire and a double from promising youngster Caolan Lavery. The FA Cup third-round replay saw Wednesday win 4-1 against Macclesfield before a 1-1 draw with Burnley (away), a 1-2 victory for Wednesday at Rochdale (FA Cup 4th Round) and a 1-1 draw with Millwall saw the end of January.

The South Yorkshire derby started the next month as Sheffield Wednesday defeated Barnsley 1-0 with a 97th Chris Maguire goal which had three red cards including one for Sheffield Wednesday (Jermaine Johnson) and two for Barnsley including debutant Emmanuel Frimpong and Jacob Mellis. A 2-0 victory at Reading followed for Wednesday before successive home defeats at the hands of Wigan (3-0) and Derby (0-1) preceded a 0-2 victory at Huddersfield for the Owls. An interesting FA Cup run was ended at the hands of Charlton Athletic with a Quarter-Final with Sheffield United beckoning as Wednesday lost 1-2 at Hillsborough. 

Gary Madine,one more chance?

March was an up-and-down month for Wednesday which started with a 1-0 victory over Middlesbrough (h) before a shocking 2-0 defeat at Yeovil and a 1-0 defeat to Wigan quickly soured the atmosphere with fans. That was turned around when Wednesday gained revenge for the early season drubbing against Birmingham by defeating the Blues 4-1 (with 2 goals from Lavery, loanee Leon Best and a Packwood O.G) before a three nil victory at home against QPR had SWFC climbing the table. Another derby day defeat for Wednesday saw them go down 1-0 at Doncaster before beating promotion favourites Brighton 1-0 at home before ending March with a 1-4 home loss at the hands of Watford. March also saw the release of jailed Wednesday striker Gary Madine who was imprisoned for assaulting two football fans in October, upon his release the striker was loaned to Carlisle United for the rest of the season.

April started slowly for Wednesday as they 2-1 at promotion chasing Leicester before drawing 3-3 at Nottingham Forest and 3-3 at home to Blackburn with a late goal from Atdhe Nuhiu in the 95th minute securing a point after coming back from 1-3 down. The Owls gained revenge over Bournemouth on a visit to the South Coast which saw Wednesday come away 4-2 winners and with the season already safe, a drab 2-3 home loss to relegation haunted Charlton Athletic was followed by a poor 1-3 home defeat, the last Hillsborough game of the season, at the hands of Bolton. 

May saw only one game - the last game of the season, which was a trip to Ipswich Town where over 2000 travelling Wednesdayites saw the Owls lose 2-1 where a strike from Kieron Lee was not enough with goals from Smith and last later goal by Green ended the season. 

Caolan Lavery hits the target again.

End of season player stats.

Goals:

Chris Maguire - 10

Atdhe Nuhiu - 8

Connor Wickham - 8

Leon Best - 5

Michail Antonio - 4

Caolan Lavery - 4

Shots: (from www.swfc.co.uk)

Atdhe Nuhiu - 25 (24 on target) 

Michail Antonio - 23 (22 on target)

Chris Maguire - 18 (18 on target)

Caolan Lavery - 13 (13 on target)

Jermaine Johnson - 11 (9 on target)

Loanee Connor Wickham scoring for fun at SWFC.

Assists:

Chris Maguire - 4

Kieran Lee - 4

Atdhe Nuhiu - 4

Michail Antonio - 3

Jacques Maghoma - 3

Appearances: (from www.swfc.co.uk)

Jeremy Hélan - 44 

Liam Palmer - 40

Atdhe Nuhiu - 39

Chris Kirkland - 35

Jermaine Johnson - 28

Reda Johnson and Atdhe Nuhiu

Discipline:

Sam Hutchinson - 6 yellow, 2 red

Giles Coke - 1 yellow, 1 red 

Jose Semedo - 4 yellow, 1 red

Atdhe Nuhiu - 7 yellow, 0 red 

Miguel Llera - 8 yellow, 0 red 

Scoring & Conceding:

Goals FOR - 63 (9th in league)

Goals AGAINST - 65 (16th in league)

Scored FIRST - 20 (Won 12)

Opp score FIRST - 25 (Won 1)

Clean sheet - 10 (Won 9)

Fail to score - 10 (Lost 9)

TheSWFCarmchairfan highs, lows and merits.

Best result: SWFC 6-0 LUFC

Worst result: SWFC 1-4 BCFC

Best performance: SWFC 6-0 LUFC

Worst performance: SWFC 0-2 YTFC

Best player: Liam Palmer (huge improvement)

Worst player: J.Johnson (like the man, offered little though)

Overall opinion of the 2013/2014 season:

Free signing, Glenn Loovens is now out of contract.

Popular opinion or not, I believe this season has been a success. Stuart Gray has been a revelation in the hot seat along with Lee Bullen splitting his duty between the first team and development squad. It makes me wonder what would have been had Dave Jones been dismissed earlier in the season when the majority of the fan base was against the man that led the team to promotion glory. Stuart Gray took the reigns and admirably saved the season which looked doomed to failure. He himself described the season in three words as 'poor - good - average' and there isn't a Wednesday fan who would disagree with that. It seems the end of the season didn't run until the end of the fixture calendar for the Owls but once relegation was mathematically impossible, the flip-flops were on and the loungers had blue and white towels laying on them. I for one do not blame the players for that - it's been a roller-coaster for them as well as the fans, with a tremendous effort from them to turn a disastrous start into a safe conclusion. With acquisitions such as USA international Oguchi Onyewu, Connor Wickham and Glenn Loovens, Wednesday made some solid signings in their battle but whether Oguchi and Glenn will sign for another season or more is yet to be seen and the form of Connor may yet see the youngster pull on an England shirt at the World Cup in Brazil. The list of out of contract players is long and few people will celebrate the extensions of contracts for Martin Taylor, David Prutton, Jermaine Johnson etc. It seems the times are shifting at Hillsborough and the a better quality of playing staff are Hillsborough-bound. The defence needs tightening if next season we are to mount a climb up the table and signatures from Kirkland, Loovens and Onyewu are a high priority as well as more signings. The attacking department is surprisingly strong with the reemergence of Chris Maguire, the growth of work-horse Atdhe Nuhiu and the encouraging excitement of Caolan Lavery. Midfield support from Michail Antonio, Jeremy Hélan (as well as LB), Liam Palmer (as well as RB), Jacques Maghome and Kieran Lee are a very good starting point and acquisitions will further strengthen the department. The younger teams at the club are looking promising with talent throughout and who knows who the next break through player will be - Jack Stobbs? Emmanuel Dieseruvwe? Charlie Dawes? The future is getting brighter and next season could possibly be a massive season for Sheffield Wednesday.