pat blondeau

True but these two last games could break that run. To beat West Brom we need to do something we haven’t achieved so far this season and beat a side in the top 6. But if we are going to do it what better way to do it than in front of a full house at Hillsborough. And Sunderland’s recent form is like a bottom 9 team. I think both games are winnable

Xisco Pulis Yorath

Against the top 15 sides in the league this season we’ve won 3 games out of 28. Obviously that stat isn’t helped in that 10 of those games were under Xisco but even under Röhl we’ve still only won 3 out of 18 against the top 15. But against the rest of the bottom 9 we’ve now won 10 games out of 16. We’ve clearly struggled to beat top half sides this season but what we have done very well is beat the teams that are down there with us. We’ve now doubled Rotherham, QPR and Blackburn. That’s a massive 18 points we’ve picked up from those 3 clubs

Wilder has also said the same but I’d normally be happy to be on the other side of the debate to Wilder

The best cup run I can remember in fairly recent years from a lower league club was Bradford City making it to the league cup final in 2013. And that came in the cup with no replays. I think getting rid of replays could give the smaller clubs a better chance of an upset and a cup run

How many examples can you give in the last 10 years of club’s who’ve had a money spinning replay? Or a club who’ve survived due to a cup replay? This isn’t a dig at your post either, I just can’t think of many examples of small clubs taking a big club to a replay in recent years. In the 1980s the FA cup weekends were the highlights of the season because it was the only televised live football. But in recent years, I think the league cup has been a better cup than the FA cup from a spectator’s point of view because you’re guaranteed a result on the night

Yes I’m going to go against the grain here but I think it’s the right decision. Can we really complain about cup replays being scrapped when you look the crowds we got for the cup games this season? We don’t even open the full ground for the cup games. I know will some will say it’ll hit the smaller clubs but realistically how often does a small club hit the jackpot and earn a replay against a big club? I can barely think of any examples where a small club has had a pay day replay against a big club in the last 10 years. Also if there’d been no replays we may well have knocked Coventry out this season on the night. Extra time and pens at Hillsborough against Coventry would have made it a better game and we may well have gone through. Once it went to a replay at Coventry it was a game none of us wanted that we were always likely to lose anyway

We’re all banking on the big man on Saturday

Against teams in the top 15 in the league we’ve won 3 games out of 28. Against teams in the top 6 we’ve won none out of 11. Xisco was dire but Röhl has also struggled to beat decent sides with this group of players. It’s all conjecture how many points we could have had by now if Röhl had been here for the full season but I still think we’d have been in a relegation battle. Both managers have been left short of having the tools they required by the owner

The club said both the Plymouth and Derby games last season were sell outs and the attendance for both games was just over 33,400 so that seems to be the most we can get in now. https://www.swfc.co.uk/news/2023/april/derby-match-sold-out/ This figure seems to have steadily gone down over the last 12 years: The last time we had over 34k at Hillsborough was the Brighton semi in 2016. The last time we had over 35k at Hillsborough was the Arsenal game in 2015. And the last time we had over 36k at Hillsborough was the Wycombe game in 2012

Yes we can debate how many points we’d have if Röhl had been appointed at the start of the season. But it’d have been completely different season and even Röhl may have found himself under pressure looking at who we played in the first 10 games. As it was, coming in after Xisco he had a bit of a free hit and the football he played was a breath of fresh air for everyone after Xisco. He also had a decent run of fixtures to get him up and running at Wednesday. Ultimately there’s only one league table that really matters and that’s the league table after 43 games where we’re sitting 23rd. As bad as the start was and as much as I like Röhl we were in a position to pull away from it 7 games ago and we’ve not been good enough to do it so far. We now have to pull something out from the last 3 games

RIP Simon. Great photo at Wembley to remember. All the best to you and your family and I hope your dad gets a good send off

This is no defence of Xisco, he was dreadful and it was the some of the worst football I’ve ever seen at Wednesday. But when you look at who we played he did have a tough run of fixtures in those first 10 games and I think any manager would have struggled in the early season after the summer we’d had. Out of the 10 games Xisco was in charge, 8 of them were against sides currently in the top half and he didn’t play a single game against a side currently in the bottom 10. You’d expect Röhl would have picked up more than 2 points from those 10 games but given how poor we’ve been against top half sides all season it’s debatable how many more he’d have picked up. We’ve won 12 games all season and 9 of them have come against teams currently in the bottom 9. A third of the games we’ve won this season have come against two sides, Rotherham and QPR

In the interview Röhl did with the German magazine last month he was asked: 'Are you going to stay at Sheffield Wednesday regardless of your divisional status?' He replied with: ‘Until May 5 and at the moment I'm fully focused on current season, so it ends the way we want to. Then we'll sit down and assess the situation.' Based on that reply from Röhl I’d say it’s far from guaranteed he’ll still be here next season. Röhl could have easily answered that question by saying he’s committed to Sheffield Wednesday until the end of his contract. But all he said was he’s focused on the current season and then we’ll sit down and assess the situation

Decisions have gone against us at times but I could name plenty of decisions that have gone for us too. A few decisions that have gone for us last 12 months off the top of my head: Flint should have been sent off in the play off semi second leg. The play off final, the two big decisions in the match were Barnsley’s penalty appeal and the red card. Both went in our favour. Hull at home this season the red card was debatable and changed the game in our favour. The Hull red card was overturned after the game. Bristol City at home this season Bernard could have been sent off in the first half for the first offence he was booked for. Middlesborough away they had two pens that should have been given turned down before the third one was given. You could easily make a similar list for decisions that have gone against us but there is no agenda against us. Some go for us, some go against us