Sheffield Wednesday lost 4-0 at home to Millwall in the Championship on Saturday; the Owls’ 12th defeat of the season already.
Sheffield Wednesday have just six points on the board. They remain rooted to the foot of the Championship table and already nine points from safety, with Danny Rohl having lost four of his first five games at the helm.
Saturday’s defeat though was perhaps the worst performance we’ve seen under Rohl so far and it highlighted the deep-lying issues at the club, with the main one notable being the club’s poor summer recruitment.
Journalist Joe Crann pointed out the flaws with Wednesday’s recruitment after the game on Saturday and now former Wednesday midfielder Carlton Palmer has weighed in on the situation.
Speaking to Football League World, the 57-year-old said:
“A disappointing result [on Saturday] for Danny Rohl and Sheffield Wednesday.
“We’ll never know about how much Danny knew about the playing squad before he took charge and his remit. The fans will support him because it’s what they do.“
Sheffield Wednesday signed 12 new players in the summer but very few of them have received any kind of praise for their performances so far this season.
Crann said that Wednesday failed to add any added quality in the summer, instead giving then boss Xisco Munoz more players instead of more quality.
Palmer continued:
“The quality of the squad is not good enough, the recruitment’s not been good enough and that isn’t Danny’s fault as he can only work with what he has.
“It will remain to be seen whether he can get enough points to stay in touch (with the teams above) and then recruit well to get Wednesday out of the mess they find themselves in.
“16 games in on 6 points. Even if they got a point per game from now on, based on last season’s figures they’d be relegated. It’s a very difficult situation for the loyal fans and the manager.”
Poor recruitment, poor results, and relegation looming?
Yes, yes, and it seems so.
Whoever the manager is at Sheffield Wednesday will struggle to get a tune out of this current crop of players.
It’s very much a League One squad right now with the Owls failing to bring in any of the necessary quality in the summer, which has resulted in this rather catastrophic start to the season.
Palmer’s comments are largely true and the fear of relegation is becoming greater and greater with every passing fixture and every passing defeat.
Even though there’s a long way to go this season, it seems like Wednesday don’t really stand a chance of beating the drop this season and for Rohl, what the future holds remains to be seen.
Whether or not he’d stay on if the club was relegated, and if there’s no signs of maters off the pitch improving, also remains to be seen, and few would blame him if he left the club after this season.
There remains a very slight glimmer of hope, however. Owner Dejphon Chansiri has the chance to earn back a very few plaudits if he can back Rohl in January, though the chances of that appear to be slim.
Up next for the Owls is a trip to Birmingham City this weekend.