Video: Inconsistent Sheffield Wednesday urged to be mentally strong as they seek to get back to winning ways

The Owls have been heavily criticised since Saturday’s defeat to struggling Bolton Wanderers.

Carvalhal’s charges have failed to beat any of the bottom four teams this season, collecting just two points in meetings with Birmingham City, Burton Albion, Sunderland and Bolton.

Wednesday’s poor showing against Bolton came on the back of a fine home victory over promotion hopefuls Leeds United.

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Carvalhal, who takes his side to Derby County tomorrow, said the Owls have spoken internally about their slow starts.

He said: “I would be more worried if it was a question of quality or a question of tactics but it doesn’t seem anything like that. It seems more mental.

“I don’t want to talk about this too much in the press because it is an internal thing.

“We must change our mentality and we must be more strong mentally to be more consistent.”

He hopes the team have learned valuable lessons from their 2-1 loss at the Macron Stadium

“It is strange because we do very well against the strong teams but against the weak teams we broke the mentality,” he said. “We must be more active and not so reactive in some games to be more consistent.”

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Despite coming under increased pressure from supporters in recent weeks, Carvalhal has vowed not to quit.

When asked if he “feared the consequences” of a defeat to Derby, he said: “I don’t think I depend on one game, two games, three games. I don’t think about that.

“There are rumours and I understand the rumours when we are not winning, but I believe there are eight to 10 clubs down near us that the expectation is to be promoted. All of them maybe have the same problem.

“When you have 10 to 12 teams going for promotion, one will be first and one will be 12 fighting it out. We know what we can do.”

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