Sheffield Wednesday have a staggering amount of players either out of contract or leaving at the end of their loan deals in the summer.
At Hillsborough this summer, Danny Rohl will certainly have a lot of work to do.
The German currently sees 18 of his first-team players leaving; either at the end of their contracts in June or when their loan deals expire.
But inevitably, Sheffield Wednesday‘s fate in the Championship this season will dictate whether a lot of players stay or move on.
Sheffield Wednesday in the Championship this season
There’s just seven games of the season remaining.
At the 39-game mark, the Owls sit in 23rd place of the Championship table and are on 39 points, following a 1-1 draw vs Swansea City in their last outing.
Wednesday dominated that game but couldn’t take their chances in the second half.
But a win against Middlesbrough on Easter Monday could see the Owls move as high as 19th, though Boro in 10th will be hoping for a win to keep their play-off hopes alive.
And defeat would surely see Sheffield Wednesday’s out of contract players move a step closer to the exit door.
Danny Rohl on Sheffield Wednesday player contracts
Speaking to The Star ahead of his side’s trip to the Riverside on Monday, Rohl said on the future of his players:
“There are two things. Behind the scenes we are looking and considering what we can do. The key point at the moment, we are not in the situation where we know exactly where we will be next season. This makes things difficult.
“It means we prepare two shadow squads. We have one for ‘this’ and one for ‘this’. This is our job and we must do this. Hopefully we can come over the line as soon as possible and then we can make contracts and get them done immediately. This is the challenge. We have something in our mind, I always speak with Kevin (Beadell, head of recruitment). We will have some big meetings in the following weeks and we will look at what we can do.”
Rohl concluded:
“We achieve our goals and then we speak about the rest.”
Player futures not only reliant on Championship survival
Whilst Championship survival would go a long way in securing the futures of many of Sheffield Wednesday’s current first-team players, there’s another huge factor to consider here.
The future of Rohl.
Sunderland have recently been linked with Rohl and should he leave in the summer, regardless of whether Wednesday stay up, it could tempt a lot of players into leaving.
Rohl has completely galvanised the side and he could even take a few players to Sunderland should he head there, or wherever he might go.
The dream ticket for Dejphon Chansiri this summer is that the club stays up and Rohl commits his future for the 2024/25 season, with his contract out in 2025.
That would surely entice a lot of players to stay on board for that season at least, but then the club could find themselves in a similar predicament next summer.
Right now there’s no long-term plan in place at Wednesday, but one could steadily fall into place if the club beats the drop.
Rohl though seems to have some kind of basic plan in place with these two shadow squads, though how promising that might prove remains to be seen.
Kick off vs Middlesbrough is at 3pm on Monday.