Crewe vs Sheffield Wednesday: Fan Preview - Must win game for the Owls

In my view, the game at Crewe’s The Mornflake Stadium this Saturday is a must win game for Wednesday if we are to be serious promotion contenders.

Crewe sit 23rd in League One and have had a poor season so far in many respects. They are still certainly capable of beating us if we aren’t up to it, especially considering our results against teams such as Morecambe and Gillingham, but is a game we have to be winning.

On Tuesday, Wednesday showed a different aspect of themselves, grafting out a 0-0 draw against Portsmouth after being down to 10 men since the 69th minute. It was a hard fought point with exceptional performances from the defence, particularly Bailey Peacock-Farrell and Liam Palmer.

Luongo will certainly be a huge miss for us in the next three games after his red card. For me, there can be no complaints over the red, his foot was high and he caught his man, he simply had to go – and from that moment most fans would have said we’ll lose this, including myself, so it was great to see us stand firm and keep the clean sheet.

Injuries in the squad still remain a huge concern, with no recognised centre-back in the squad at all on Tuesday night.

Hopefully, Chey Dunkley, Josh Windass, and Dennis Adeniran are all fit to return to the squad this weekend in this must win fixture.

It is really positive to see though, that when we have an injury crisis, we have players in the squad like Callum Paterson and Marvin Johnson that can play multiple positions and be somewhat effective in those positions too.

I would have liked to see more attacking against Portsmouth and more of an attempt to take the game to the opposition, but after the red card, it is completely understandable that we sat back to hold onto a draw.

When we did attack, a lot seemed to come from the right-side with Jack Hunt making several positive runs down the right and his delivery is definitely something we need to take advantage of. Dele-Bashiru’s driving runs from midfield are also a real positive for the side, driving us up the pitch and getting us into really promising areas.

Against Crewe, I would love to see us field an attacking side and take the game to them and earn the three points. In a game such as this, it is likely the opposition will let us have a lot of the ball, so as well as creativity, we need our best attackers like Windass and Gregory out there to fire us to a win.

It’s a game for me, that if we come away without anything but a win, it will be a mightily disappointing result.

Line-up I would go with: (5-2-3) Peacock-Farrell, Hunt, Palmer, Dunkley, Johnson, Corbeanu, Dele-Bashiru, Bannan, Kamberi, Windass, Gregory

My Prediction: Crewe 0-2 Wednesday