Chris Holt is joined as usual by Joe Crann and Alex Miller to take a look back over the transfer window which closed last week and ask if Sheffield Wednesday are any better off than they were a month ago. On the pitch it's far from rosy with two capitulations in a week coming against Huddersfield and Coventry, albeit in the cup, and they simply can't afford another in a crucial clash with improving Birmingham City on Friday.
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00:00 [MUSIC]
00:10 Welcome to Everywhere and Nowhere,
00:18 a Sheffie Wednesday podcast brought to you by The Star.
00:21 With Joe Graham, Alex Miller, and your host, Chris Holt.
00:25 [MUSIC]
00:32 A few weeks ago, optimism was pouring out of Helmsborough.
00:35 [INAUDIBLE] Wednesday would drag themselves out of the relegation matter.
00:40 Since then, transfer window's closed and the team has suffered some very damaging
00:43 defeats.
00:44 And all of a sudden, that optimism has been squeezed out,
00:47 with the fear of the drop once again looming large.
00:50 Everywhere and Nowhere is back to look over the past week in S6, and
00:53 ahead to what is an absolutely crucial clash with Birmingham City on Friday night.
00:57 I'm Chris Holt, and joining me are Alex Miller from what I've written down here,
01:01 what is, I'm sure, a salubrious hotel, since Friday night is not the case at all,
01:06 in commentary.
01:07 And Joe Graham, also fresh from reporting on another heavy loss
01:12 on Tuesday night.
01:12 Like I said, there's not an awful lot to be smiling about,
01:20 and you can tell that by your faces.
01:23 No, no, it's not been a fun couple of weeks, has it?
01:26 No, we will start.
01:30 Alex, do you want to complain about your hotel publicly, or
01:33 do you just want to wait and send them a-
01:36 I'll save it for the strongly worded email that-
01:40 Strongly worded.
01:41 The chain of hotels that will, at the minute, remain unnamed.
01:49 You can name them, name them if you want.
01:55 I'll wait to see what they come back with, and then I'll get my-
02:00 excuse me, I'm a social media influencer.
02:02 Do you know who I am?
02:05 Yeah, and I'll just get Joe to tweet it with his masses of followers.
02:09 Yeah, all my South African guys going, right, we need to have a word of this hotel.
02:14 Yeah, I'm definitely not staying in that hotel that rhymes with Tanya.
02:21 [laughter]
02:25 Anyway, right, I'll tell you what, we're going to start.
02:29 It's been a rough couple of days on the pitch, so we're going to kick off with that.
02:34 We'll go back to Saturday, which I still find absolutely bizarre.
02:42 I watched the first half of the match before I had to go out and found out about an hour and a half later
02:50 that Wednesday had been absolutely torn apart and capitulated.
02:56 What happened, Alex?
03:02 It's a good question, and a few days on I'm not entirely sure myself.
03:05 I think Wednesday have got this habit of midway through the second half conceding goals and not scoring them.
03:16 It's interesting trying to work out why that's the case.
03:22 I think, particularly away from home, they can leave themselves a little bit open as they're trying to impact the game
03:29 and trying to go on and win the game.
03:31 It seemed like that was the case on Saturday.
03:34 I think the first goal was from a set-piece and that really, really turned the game.
03:41 Anthony Massaba was up against Matty Pearson.
03:44 Anyone that's seen those two players can fill in answers on a postcard as to why that match-up happened.
03:54 Whether it was deliberate or not, Danny Roehl didn't really answer the question on that after the game.
04:01 From there, I think Wednesday opened up a little bit.
04:04 Four goals in 12 minutes, it was just carnage, really, the way that Huddersfield came on.
04:13 I think they got in behind twice, didn't they, Wednesday, continued playing the high line.
04:19 It's concerning because it happened again last night as well.
04:23 Three goals in eight minutes.
04:25 I think there were three goals in 22 minutes at Southampton.
04:28 The last three away games, really, in the blink of an eye, all three matches have been well and truly taken away from them.
04:34 The fact is that they've conceded 12 in three recent away games.
04:39 So, yes, one for Danny Roehl and his coaching staff to try and work out, I think.
04:46 Joe, I'm not trying to turn on the manager here.
04:53 I know that he's very popular and I know that people do see him as being the man who can lift Wednesday eventually.
05:04 At some point, however, there has to be a realisation that whatever he is doing is not working
05:12 and there has to be some kind of change to prevent these capitulations from happening.
05:17 I've seen their conceding goals one after another.
05:23 Heads have gone completely, seemingly.
05:27 It's not even just as heads have gone.
05:30 They just seem all over the place.
05:32 A couple of the goals last night, I can't remember which one it was, but they basically just ran through.
05:38 Ran through the midfield, ran through the defence, slotted it in and nobody was doing anything.
05:44 Nobody taking any responsibility to put a tackle in.
05:47 Nobody taking any responsibility to just cut off any space for him to run into.
05:53 And at some stage, and like I said, I don't want to come down too heavily on the manager
05:58 because he is the very least of Sheffied Wednesday's worries at this stage.
06:04 At some stage, there has to be some level of criticism against him, hasn't it?
06:09 Yes, I think so. Obviously, no one is against criticism.
06:15 I think the problem that Wednesday have got for a large part was
06:20 it almost felt for a long time that Wednesday were performing above themselves
06:24 and I think that he was getting so much more out of them than it felt like should have been possible.
06:31 And now that level has sort of dropped.
06:35 I mean, you look at last night and yes, it was 1-1 at half-time, but Coventry were by far the better side.
06:44 The result come the end was kind of where we expected it to go.
06:48 It's the nature of how they conceded.
06:51 If they conceded four over the course of a game, I'm not saying it would have been better.
06:56 It would have still been a horrible result.
06:58 But it's how it just like goal after goal after goal in such a short space of time.
07:04 It's almost like, you know, we spoke about it in years before, sort of pre-Darren Moore,
07:10 how Wednesday would just collapse.
07:13 We saw it so many times in so many games.
07:17 I was talking about the Luton match and the relegation season before when Wednesday lost 3-2,
07:22 there after being 2-0 up and just completely falling apart to lose 3-2.
07:26 And that felt like the day that Wednesday got relegated to me.
07:29 And I think the Huddersfield game felt like that.
07:32 That was the, you know, in every year you have, in every relegation season,
07:37 there's always a game when you think, oh yeah, that's it.
07:40 Now we can start to make peace with what's going to happen next.
07:43 And yeah, that felt like that one to me.
07:46 And I just think the worry is that, I mean, we're speaking about this last night,
07:53 Danny worked so hard to pick the boys up and get them back into things.
07:57 And now I think that the concern is, is he going to be able to do that again
08:03 after what's just happened with the Huddersfield game?
08:06 Because that was so big, considering the proximity between the two teams
08:13 and what that result means for the league table.
08:16 To pick them back up for that is, from that, is going to be incredibly difficult.
08:22 And yes, last night was a cup game, but it still follows a sort of pattern.
08:27 So that doesn't help that it was a cup game.
08:30 It doesn't help that it was a second string side.
08:33 Yeah, a lot of soul searching to do for Danny, I think.
08:38 And obviously it goes without saying, the Birmingham game is another game
08:44 that Wednesday have to try and get something out of.
08:46 I think it's worth saying, just to follow on what Joe said there about Danny
08:50 and getting more out of the squad, particularly in that busy Christmas period,
08:56 than perhaps many were expecting.
09:00 I think it's worth saying, in the two collapses, if you like,
09:03 Huddersfield and last night against Coventry,
09:07 it was very different in how they went about it tactically.
09:11 As I said, Huddersfield were very open in conceding that sort of swell of goals.
09:17 And then last night, Wednesday was sort of very deep.
09:21 And it was the quality of Coventry that got the goals in that little period.
09:29 They were a very different quality of goal, weren't they?
09:31 Yeah, I mean, they were completely different goals altogether.
09:34 Huddersfield got them behind and Coventry just had enough to sort of create
09:38 that little bit of space for themselves and put on the finish
09:42 that was good enough to beat Pierce Charles.
09:44 So, yeah, I think it's worth saying, and look, like Joe said,
09:50 no one's infallible, no one's beyond critique, even by idiots like us
09:58 that probably don't quite know what we're talking about.
10:02 There's a reason that Danny Royal's chosen to come to Sheffield Wednesday
10:05 and start his managerial journey at a club like Wednesday.
10:09 And I think it's those in-game decisions and how he goes about certain things
10:13 that he's learning.
10:16 Everything else, more or less, he's done before in his assistant role,
10:20 the analysis, the preparation, standing up in front of a group of players,
10:25 the training ground stuff.
10:29 But it's those crunch in-game decisions and being able to stop a charge
10:37 such as those in the last couple of games, regardless of how blunt his tools
10:41 may or may not be, and he's hinted at that a little bit as well.
10:47 But, yeah, he's learning on the job, and I think that should probably
10:52 be acknowledged.
10:54 I've seen a few people talk about a weak mentality, which, again,
10:57 is something that has basically been used as a stick to beat Sheffield Wednesday
11:03 players with for probably around five or six years now, at least.
11:09 But this is a completely new team.
11:14 This isn't the same team as was four, five, six years ago.
11:20 So there's no correlation there.
11:23 There's no way you can say they're still weak because managers have changed,
11:30 personnel have changed.
11:32 But it did seem like there was a weakness in the team over the past couple
11:38 of games where they couldn't cope with periods of incessant pressure.
11:45 And that is something that you're going to have to deal with because,
11:48 whether you like it or not, there's a lot of teams much, much better
11:53 than Sheffield Wednesday, and they're going to put Sheffield Wednesday,
11:57 particularly the defence in the midfield, under a lot of pressure
12:00 in the coming games.
12:02 And that's something that he's going to have to deal with.
12:05 As you said, Alex, or sorry, Joe, said that he's managed to rally them
12:14 at certain stages to lift them back up, and we saw some results.
12:19 But you can't keep doing that, can you?
12:24 You can't keep having to do that.
12:27 This is my fear now, that Wednesday have so quickly adopted this
12:33 high intensity, and he speaks about his demands and all this sort of stuff.
12:39 To go from 'Cisco ball', if that's what we want to call it,
12:44 to the way that Danny's going about it, it takes a demand on the body
12:50 and on the mind as well.
12:52 And remember all that chatter about Marcelo Bielsa in Leeds
12:55 and what happens at the end of the season.
12:58 You throw in a pitch that, from what we can gather,
13:04 is causing problems in terms of the players' bodies.
13:08 And, yes, it all adds up to nerves really as to how Wednesday
13:14 can rally themselves and go again.
13:17 I think personally, looking at last night, it's difficult not to have
13:22 to fall under feet, but I don't read a great deal into last night.
13:26 I think it was kids and bit parts that are probably pretty low on my side.
13:34 You wouldn't do if they hadn't shaped for a couple of days previous.
13:40 There were nine changes.
13:43 It was a completely different side against a full-strength Coventry
13:46 who have barely lost since Halloween.
13:51 Do you know what I mean?
13:52 I really don't, whether they'd won 4-0 or lost 4-0.
13:56 That side last night was basically put out there not to lose,
14:01 but to rest up for a far more important engagement on Friday.
14:10 I know exactly what you're saying, but at the same time,
14:14 I don't think Wednesday will be looking into too much minute detail
14:20 over it, if you know what I mean.
14:23 Okay.
14:24 Last week, we weren't here last week because we weren't here with a podcast,
14:29 at least, because there was a match and then we were straight into
14:34 transfer deadline day, which proved to be absolutely chaotic,
14:38 which let's face it, is peak Wednesday.
14:46 Let's run the rule over the window as a whole, Joe.
14:52 You ended up with a couple of players on deadline day.
14:58 There was another player who they clearly wanted so much so that he spent
15:04 the afternoon sitting in a Sheppey hotel.
15:07 Please don't make me talk about Duncan Maguire.
15:14 Yeah, well, there's no point talking too much about it.
15:17 I mean, the pair of lads at the minute doesn't actually have a club to play
15:21 for, unless that's changed.
15:24 But from what I can gather, the registration hasn't gone through with
15:27 Blackburn, certainly from what I've seen.
15:31 But we'll talk about how Wednesday ended up and do you think that they are
15:41 any better off now than they were when the window opened at the start of January?
15:50 I wouldn't say they were better off, personally.
15:53 I think numerically, they're, I think, slightly better off or even, maybe.
16:02 But in terms of the players that they've brought in, it's obviously some
16:07 quantities like Pervaded, we've heard very good things about him.
16:12 Alex can probably tell you a bit more.
16:14 He's got people who've seen him play a few more times.
16:19 Pedersen, obviously, has come in and look, baptism of fire by all accounts
16:24 against Huddersfield.
16:25 It was a tough game for someone to come into, especially having not played
16:28 in so long.
16:30 But I think that the concerning thing for Wednesday has been and will be
16:36 the fact that Danny clearly didn't get who he wanted.
16:39 There were players that Wednesday tried to get who he didn't get.
16:42 And these two deals got done on the last day just as a case of we need to try
16:47 and get more bodies in.
16:49 And it didn't really feel, with so much of Wednesday's window, that they were
16:54 getting their way, getting what they actually wanted.
16:57 And that's obviously a problem.
16:59 Danny was increasingly frustrated with what was going on.
17:01 It was clear to see on his face whenever we spoke to him during that period
17:08 how annoyed he was at the whole scenario.
17:13 And I just don't think that - I think Wednesday needed to pick up players
17:18 that were substantially better than what they had.
17:21 And I'm not sure that they've managed to do that, if I'm honest.
17:25 Alex, we - anybody in their right mind couldn't describe us as
17:34 Chancery apologists.
17:40 However, he came under a bit of a stick because of those deals that Joe said
17:45 that kind of didn't go over the line.
17:49 It is unfair, yes, they automatically think that it was because he wasn't
17:56 giving enough money or he wasn't putting his hand in his pocket, whatever.
18:00 There are a whole lot of moving parts in these kinds of deals that mean that
18:05 it becomes difficult to do sometimes and ultimately you miss out.
18:11 Yes, I think so.
18:12 I think it's difficult to know exactly what's popping off in these deals.
18:18 The idea that Real wasn't backed, I don't know is the honest answer.
18:22 I think, look, if Chancery had gone his £10 million get us out of this hole,
18:29 it would have been a different kettle of spuds.
18:31 But deals for Connor Coventry and Mika Bieleff were very, very close.
18:41 Very close.
18:42 You've got to think that financial terms were pretty much agreed,
18:48 certainly in outline terms.
18:50 Money was put down for Duncan Maguire.
18:53 We know that there's a scepticism out there perhaps that we've been duped.
19:02 Without going into it, I think the mechanics of how we found out about that
19:07 and all the rest of it, it just doesn't add up that it was some sort of
19:13 chess play from the club.
19:15 It'd have to be very convoluted for it to have been that way.
19:19 Yes, an absolute mastermind move from Dapon Chancery.
19:24 Yes, we'll just leave that one there.
19:26 So, yes, I don't know is the really honest answer.
19:31 I think ultimately Wednesday got deals in place that they were very confident of.
19:36 Along the way with players that I think would have made a big difference.
19:42 And at the last minute, they weren't able to get those deals over the line.
19:46 So without being in those rooms, we won't know where the blame, if any, lies.
19:52 I think with Connor Coventry, obviously there's alarm bells that they missed
19:58 out to a League One side.
20:00 There's factors there, including guarantees of game time
20:04 and the geography of it.
20:07 I mean, that's one that you look at and you go, well, you want to get that one
20:14 over the line. Charlton are really struggling in League One.
20:17 And there's a rebuild going on there.
20:19 And he went to his ex-manager, but that's one.
20:22 Mika Beareth, they were keen on and had spent a lot of time on in terms
20:26 of preparation.
20:28 And Sturm Graz sort of wandered in.
20:32 You look at that, an Austrian side, title challenging.
20:35 He said himself that he's going to get lots of chances to score
20:38 and that would be better for his development.
20:40 Again, could more have been done to sort of sway him towards this is
20:44 the championship at a big club and you can make your name here
20:47 and head back to Arsenal as a competitor.
20:51 So, yes, and there's other deals as well that I think none of us ever got wind
20:56 of that they tried for.
20:57 But certainly those two were very, very close.
21:01 Yes, all in all, very, very frustrating.
21:04 I'm quite excited about Jan Pavada.
21:07 I've got a lot of mates who are Leeds fans.
21:10 I watched him a couple of times, albeit in youth football,
21:13 what feels like a very long time ago.
21:18 And, yes, I remember him in a game for Man City under 21s or 23s
21:23 at that point in the same team as Jadon Sancho and Fizz,
21:28 Daddy Bashiru, ironically.
21:31 And he was one of the better players on the pitch in a Manchester derby and stuff.
21:35 So he's certainly got a bit of talent.
21:37 It's just whether it can be honed.
21:39 And with Josh Windass out for a little while,
21:41 I think Jan Pavada could be really important over the next month or two.
21:47 Alex, second with you, you spoke to analyst in WFB football in 1867.
21:57 I'll check his Twitter handle there.
22:02 Last week, around about the types of players that Sheffield West
22:06 should be going for, as Danny Royal revealed to us,
22:10 that they were indeed looking in the free agent market.
22:15 Has there been any movement on that, do you think?
22:20 How long do you leave it for a start?
22:24 Do you just keep going until you hopefully get one?
22:28 Yeah, look, West have too many players for the 25-man squad.
22:32 I think Joe's the man to speak to on this, because he spoke to Danny last night
22:35 about the squad list and how he intends to sort of work that.
22:40 In terms of free agents, I haven't heard anything concrete in terms of names,
22:44 or I think it was heavily alluded to that they're after a striker.
22:48 The work that TW did on some of those players,
22:53 there's a Brazilian central midfielder called Matheus Roseto.
22:58 The way he was talking about it, I think I'd put the money down myself.
23:01 It's really exciting the way that – so it seems like from people
23:05 that know better than us that there are players out there.
23:10 I think people look at the free agent market and just think,
23:14 well, if they're not signed up to a team outside of the transfer window,
23:18 they're not going to be any good.
23:20 The way that football's going now and looking at other markets like MLS
23:24 when the contracts end at a different time, there are opportunities out there.
23:28 It's just a case of how heavily Wednesday sort of invests in whether that can improve
23:35 their squad that much. If it's going to take them two or three weeks
23:40 to get Matt Sharp and all the rest of it.
23:45 But yeah, we'll certainly keep digging around and trying to find
23:49 if there's any names that they're talking to.
23:51 Gary Medin is available. Just putting that out there.
23:54 Gary Medin is available. That is correct.
23:58 Tukran, I don't know why I gave you a different name there.
24:03 Because I just happened to read it as I looked down at you.
24:06 Alex Edder, you spoke to Danny last night about this could be a complicated thing
24:12 if you could just explain to us the squad list and what would have to happen
24:20 and what needs to be done if somebody else was to be brought in.
24:25 Yeah, so basically Wednesday they can register up to 25 people.
24:30 That doesn't include under-21s unless those under-21s are on loan.
24:34 So James Beadle falls into that. Basically everyone else over 21
24:39 also falls into that 25-man list.
24:41 Once the 25 are registered, you can't change that.
24:45 So that was why Mo Mendy-Abbey was left out for so long
24:49 and never brought back in.
24:50 So Wednesday we thought, look, we've got 27 players over the age of 23
24:57 or who have to be registered.
24:58 So that includes Kieran Brennan, who has not really played much.
25:02 It includes James Beadle.
25:04 We thought they'd probably leave a couple out.
25:06 We were thinking maybe Juan Delgado because he's got a long-term injury.
25:10 We had no thoughts really that Kieran Brennan was going to get into the squad.
25:14 So we thought that would be the two.
25:16 And then we thought they might leave another one out
25:19 that would leave him space for a free agent.
25:21 Potentially Lee Gregory, given how little he's played, how out of favour he is.
25:26 It was interesting talking to Daniel last night.
25:29 Basically he didn't give any names, but they've left a few out.
25:33 So there are a few first-team players that they have left out of the squad.
25:37 We might be looking at Callum Paterson with his injury that he's had.
25:41 We might now be looking at Josh Windass with the injury he's had that he's picked up.
25:46 We will find out at some point soon because the league will publish it,
25:50 I think, within seven days of the window closing.
25:52 So that should be in the next few days.
25:55 We should hear that.
25:56 But, yeah, it's going to be interesting to see who has made the cut.
25:59 Some tough decisions to make for Danny.
26:01 And if he's looking for multiple free agents as well,
26:03 then that throws up all sorts of questions.
26:07 So we'll cover that when the list is made known.
26:10 But Danny has certainly left space open.
26:13 I haven't checked recently, Alex, but they've got, I think,
26:18 a month and a bit before the actual registration window closes.
26:23 I think that's sometime in March.
26:25 So there is a cut-off point for free agents as well.
26:29 Wensley have just got to see whether it's worth it.
26:33 You know, talk about getting people up to speed.
26:36 Christian Pedersen effectively signed as a free agent,
26:38 given how little he's played in recent months.
26:41 He's not been playing much football either.
26:43 So they'll assess it.
26:46 But Darren Moore spoke a lot about that, you know,
26:48 on what it meant to sign free agents and the difficulties with signing free agents
26:52 at this point in a season.
26:54 So I think Danny will only go with what he thinks is right.
26:59 I mean, he said he's very confident in his team.
27:02 He said the commitment to the cause has been great.
27:06 And we'll just have to wait and see now.
27:08 But, yeah, the fact that he's left a few spaces open, I think,
27:12 creates questions not only over who they are,
27:16 but why they've been left out as well.
27:18 Yeah, it's going to be, like I say, very interesting to see that list when we do see it.
27:22 I think it's worth saying at this point as well that, you know,
27:25 there were opportunities to move players out in January and they weren't taken.
27:33 You know, our understanding is that Danny and the players in question were
27:38 very agreeable to getting those players, you know, moved on to other clubs,
27:43 whether it be permanent or loan.
27:45 And deals couldn't be reached for reasons, you know,
27:49 some sources, you know, describing some of the demands as excessive
27:54 or unrealistic and that sort of thing.
27:57 So we're back to where we were in the summer, really, with Marvin Johnson.
28:00 Through luck rather than judgment, obviously the Marvin Johnson thing ended up,
28:04 you know, coming around and being a positive thing.
28:06 But if players are going to be left out and stay out,
28:09 they're going to be paid by the club.
28:11 Yeah, raises big questions.
28:16 But we'll see, we'll see who's left out and how things are done.
28:22 Having not criticised Chancery earlier or trying to help him out a little bit,
28:31 that is the one thing that we can say.
28:34 It's absolute madness.
28:37 And that has been his weak point for years now,
28:42 that sometimes you just have to cut your losses.
28:46 I mean, he should know all about losses by now.
28:49 He's been running a football club for long enough.
28:53 He knows that sometimes you just have to take a hit.
28:55 And it's not really taking a hit.
28:57 They've got their money's worth.
28:58 Players like Lee Gregory, and you know, Lee Gregory won't be on a huge amount of money.
29:04 He did what they wanted him to do, and they just let him go.
29:09 The Lee Gregory one in particular is quite galling, really.
29:15 We spoke with Danny a couple of weeks ago,
29:18 it was the Coventry match, and even just before that,
29:24 Danny was saying he doesn't want players just being around
29:27 who aren't going to be playing because it's not fair on them.
29:29 And he was very open about that point.
29:33 I think he said you have to be human or something like that, wasn't it?
29:37 Was that the exact quote?
29:39 It's basically unfair on the players themselves.
29:43 I just think Lee deserves better.
29:47 Through no fault of his own, Danny said his application has been great,
29:53 his attitude has been great.
29:54 It's not like he's spat his dummy out and he's not playing because of that.
30:00 And look, Lee Gregory, by what we understand, is not going to play much football
30:08 for Sheffield Wednesday, if any football for Sheffield Wednesday,
30:10 between now and the end of the season.
30:12 If his name is one of the names left off that list,
30:15 if Wednesday had got £5 of his wages, it's £5 saved every single week
30:22 that Wednesday don't have to pay.
30:23 Do you know what I mean?
30:24 It would have just made sense to let the player go.
30:28 It's not about favours, it's not about, oh well, it looks weak if we let him go.
30:33 It's saving money on a player that is not going to play a part.
30:37 And talking about that human side of things, Lee Gregory is 35 years old.
30:43 He's put in the hard yards in football, he's done his stints in various different places.
30:49 He's probably at a point now where he will see the twilight of his career
30:55 and he will not want to be sat in the stands, not even getting on the bench to get to games.
31:01 He'll want to make as much of it as he can of this period in his career.
31:05 And I just think it's a real shame, especially given the role that Lee's played
31:12 in the last couple of seasons at Wednesday as well.
31:14 Another side to this, sorry to jump in, but it comes at a time where it's quite abundantly clear
31:21 that the contributions that the fans are making financially in terms of season tickets
31:28 and that sort of thing is important to the running of the club.
31:31 So it's just wasted money. If Lee Gregory is left off, and we are speculating to a degree,
31:38 is left off the squad list and x thousands of pounds are going to his bank account
31:42 every week to train at Middlewood Road, while the fans are being asked to help
31:48 the running of the club in their financial contribution.
31:51 That is just beggars belief, absolute beggars belief.
31:56 And I think if and when that comes around, there will be serious questions asked.
32:02 And it's difficult because Danny and Lee wanted the deal to happen, as far as we can understand.
32:09 It shouldn't be down to Lee Gregory, on what is probably his last decent contract of his career,
32:17 to rip it up for the last three months. I wouldn't do it, you wouldn't do it.
32:20 There's no other profession in the world where you would turn around and go,
32:24 rip that up and go on a League Two wage in the last three months of your last big contract.
32:30 There's no other profession in the world that anyone would even be asked to do that.
32:35 And so, yeah, it's just, I can feel myself getting riled up just having this discussion.
32:43 You're absolutely right. People are having to put their hands in their pockets.
32:48 A lot of money to pay for season tickets. And yet the financial management of the club
32:56 is absolutely shambolic when it comes to things like this.
33:00 You can talk about priorities, Joe says all you want.
33:02 It feels like that's what it comes down to, because I think we had it a few years ago,
33:08 it was kind of put to us that the feeling that the owner has is that,
33:17 why should I be paying money for somebody to be at another club?
33:23 That's okay. In any other business, maybe that makes sense, that does.
33:31 But also, it makes a lot more sense for them to be paying some of the money
33:37 rather than you paying all of it when he's not going to be doing absolutely anything for the club.
33:41 And it is absolutely scandalous and frankly, stupid.
33:46 Anyway, we will just wrap things up. We've gone over a little bit.
33:50 We'll just wrap things up very quickly. Alex Birmingham sitting on Friday night is absolutely huge.
33:56 They have come into a bit of form as we kind of expected with Tony Mowbray, Kemeny,
34:02 with picking things up a little bit, making it a bit harder to beat, which is what has happened.
34:10 They have lost a couple recently, but one of those was in a cup against Leicester
34:15 and one of them against West Brom, who are obviously a very good team.
34:20 But they are going to come to Hillsborough in good spirits and confident that they can get a win.
34:27 How will Wednesday be feeling?
34:30 That's the question, isn't it? I think in the press conference last night,
34:36 look, let's have it right, Danny's been downbeat and he's not one to hide what he's feeling.
34:45 I think the one telling thing, Joe, I don't know what you think, was when we turned towards the Birmingham game,
34:51 it was his attempt at a rallying cry, if you like.
34:59 In the question, we alluded to the fact that Wednesday has the atmosphere at Hillsborough,
35:05 can make a difference in big games. I think he sought to tap into that and not demanded.
35:12 He said it was up to everyone, he won't make demands of fans in the same way he will his players for obvious reasons.
35:19 But yes, almost challenged the fans to bring the noise and do it.
35:27 So, if you're watching this and you are going to the game on Friday, there will be an attack on the star,
35:32 but that's the challenge that's been laid down to you from the horse's mouth, from the manager, through us, to you.
35:38 To sort of, despite the miserable nature of the last week, bring the noise and let's just see where it leaves Sheffield Wednesday going into the weekend.
35:53 I like Alex's optimism there of the misery of the last week, it feels like it's been a long, long, long week as well.
36:03 It certainly feels like it, the last week feels like a month.
36:08 How do you see things going on Friday night?
36:11 I honestly don't know. I spoke earlier about my concerns for the effect that the Huddersfield game had on the players,
36:20 and I think how they respond to that is obviously key.
36:26 I suppose the saving grace is the fact that Huddersfield have got Southampton this weekend,
36:36 so worst case scenario it stays the same, you would think, because I don't see a world in which Southampton drop points against Huddersfield,
36:45 because they're very, very good.
36:48 But it's also, because of that, it's a massive opportunity for Wednesday to claw some of that gap back at the first available opportunity,
36:56 and if they can do that, then it can give a massive boost.
36:59 It's like a double whammy in it, you've got the win itself, but the clawing back of points on those above them.
37:06 So it's a huge game, and look, it shouldn't need any motivation, but you would have said the same thing about the Huddersfield game,
37:13 and we saw what happened there. I think we'll know in the first 10, 15 minutes of that game how that thing's going to play out.
37:22 We'll see how they come out of the blocks.
37:26 One of the big things Danny spoke about last night was how the running stats had dropped off,
37:31 and how even when they were losing, they were still running more than the opponents,
37:35 and that was not the case at all against Huddersfield.
37:39 I think he said, did Danny say there were 7k's down? Something like that.
37:43 It's a lot, and I think that was one of the main things that made his decision on the fact that he rested practically everybody,
37:53 because it's literally a rest. They need a break in order to play the way he wants to play.
37:59 And like I say, we'll have to see on Friday whether that's worked out or not.
38:05 It's tough because Wensley are in a very unenviable situation now.
38:11 The manager saw some of the frustrations from players yesterday after the game.
38:17 There were some gesticulations and stuff from certain players that they weren't happy with what was going on.
38:23 I think we'll see in the first 10, 15 minutes how Wensley are able to cope with it.
38:29 I do think if they can get the first goal, then they've got a real good chance of going on and sorting it.
38:36 But you have to worry that if they don't get the first goal, we see another Wensley capitulation.
38:42 If that happens at home, it's bad enough away.
38:45 If it happens at home, that crowd that we're speaking about can turn very, very quickly.
38:51 Thanks a lot, lads. That is us for this week.
38:57 We'll be back again next week.
38:59 Stay with thestar.co.uk for all the latest from Sheffield Wednesday ahead of that huge game on Friday night.
39:05 There will be a press conference tomorrow, I suspect, where we'll get a little bit more from Danny Rose.
39:11 So come to the Star for all the latest on that and reports and opinions and ratings and all those things on Friday evening and across the weekend.
39:20 Thanks to Alex, he can head back up north after his beautiful overnight stay in Coventry.
39:27 Thanks to Joel, who is now off on an assault course, I think.
39:32 And we will see you all next week for the next edition of Everywhere and Nowhere.
39:39 Thanks a lot.
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