OWLS ARE WISED-UP THIS TIME
CARLOS CARVALHAL is backing his “promotion experts” to make sure Sheffield Wednesday succeed where they failed a year ago – and send the Owls soaring back to the Premier League.
A naive Wednesday sunk to a heartbreaking 1-0 defeat by Hull in the Championship play-off final last May.
But this time boss Carvalhal insists his Hillsborough heroes have got the experience to see them go one better.
The Owls host top-six rivals Fulham today in the final fixture of the regular season, and Carvalhal said: “We now have a lot of players who have been promoted with teams before, like Ross Wallace, Steven Fletcher, Gary Hooper, Fernando Forestieri and Daniel Pudil.
“They are experts in taking teams up – and they have the winning mentality we have built.
“It’s the desire that I want, and now all my players like to win and have this attitude all the time.
“When our team loses a game, it is not a drama. But the players feel the results very strongly. They like winning a lot and don’t like it when they lose. We must take these thoughts into the play-offs.
“It is important that we continue to do what we are doing with the same attitude.”
It’s 17 long and painful years since Sheffield Wednesday last graced the top flight, but there is a growing belief in the Blue and White half of the Steel City that this is their time.
Confidence is high at Hillsborough – though Carvalhal is taking nothing for granted as his side chase a return to English football’s top table.
He warned: ”We must control such emotions because everybody has responsibility and everybody knows we haven’t achieved anything yet.
“We will try to achieve what we couldn’t do last season, and we know we have some very tough opponents to overcome.
“But we don’t look to others – we look only to ourselves.”