Barry Bannan plotting to pull QPR back in as Sheffield Wednesday man makes pressure claim

The midfield maestro spoke passionately about the desire to prove recent critics wrong on both a personal and team level after an Easter Monday defeat at Middlesbrough that extended Wednesday’s winless run to four matches heading into the final throes of their bitterly-fought survival campaign.

Having scaled back from a deficit of 12 points, Bannan’s side are just two from safety with six matches to go and despite the nature of a Riverside defeat that saw manager Danny Röhl angrily call out a perceived lack of effort, the Scot has no doubt Wednesday can rally back to retain their divisional status.

They’ll seek to jump out of the bottom three for the first time since August by beating a QPR outfit that have won back to back fixtures to jump into 16th place in a congested bottom half of the table. Martí Cifuentes is a manager who has received huge praise for his efforts in turning around a side that were for a long time locked in the relegation zone with Wednesday.

Bannan wants to drag them back there.

“It’s similar to the job the manager has done here, really,” Bannan told The Star. “They’ve won their last two games which has taken them up the table. They were a point ahead of us and now they’re seven because they’ve won both. It’s similar to the job the gaffer has done here, a great job.

“Obviously they were right in the mix but their wins have taken them away from it. But they’ll still need a win or four points or whatever to be safe. They’re not out of it yet and it’s up to us to put pressure on them on Saturday and drag them back into it. We’re just concentrating on ourselves.”

Much has been made of Wednesday’s response to difficult defeats this season. A February defeat to Huddersfield Town saw many onlookers question their strength in the relegation fight but preceded a run of five wins in six. The Owls skipper broke into a wry smile when reminded by The Star that many were writing them off once more.

“It’s going to be a tough game,” Bannan said. “Their form is good at the minute. We go there knowing that if the right Sheffield Wednesday turn up, we should be confident of getting the points.

“They were a point above us, they won two games in such a short space of time and everybody is saying that they’re safe. It just shows you, if you can win back to back games you have a great chance of pulling away. It is tight and in these last six games it’ll be about who performs best and who deals with the pressure best. Those teams will stay up.”