Exclusive:Unpaid wages, captaincy and pride - Barry Bannan opens up amid continued Sheffield Wednesday chaos
Barry Bannan is more than Sheffield Wednesday’s captain now… He’s a beacon of light in a dark time. And he just wants to play football.
On Tuesday night the Scot ran himself into the ground for the 457th time in Wednesday colours, and was involved in his 110th goal for the club as well. He’s on a contract which, in footballing terms, is unbefitting of a player of his ability, but he signed it because he wanted to be in the trenches, fighting it out for the future of a football club that he loves - and that loves him.
His job is to perform on the football field… To create, to lead, to score. But in recent times it’s developed into something more complex, more miserable. Because Barry Bannan and his Sheffield Wednesday teammates never really know when they’re going to get paid.
“Obviously a captain is a leader, so when things like this happen your job changes,” he said, speaking to The Star this week. “This isn’t the sort of thing that normal captains have to deal with. It’s as new for me as it is for others, so it’s hard to find the right and wrong way… I get that maybe it’s my job to come in and do certain things, but it’s not - my job is to try and win football games. I can’t physically do anything to solve this, all I can do is be honest and when I’m asked questions, answer them.
“It’s never nice when you receive the news, because you’re actually hoping the closer it gets to payday that that news isn’t coming. But we’re now in a position where we kind of know it’s coming before it comes - not from the club, but just because there’s no smoke without fire and we see on social media people finding things out that we don’t even know about. So we know it’s coming, but you try to tell yourself that it’s not. Breaking it to the players is hard, but it’s got to the point where it’s becoming normal - and that’s crazy, because it shouldn’t be. As a group of players we expect it, though, which really is crazy. We’re a Championship club and it shouldn’t be this way.”
In the past he’s had a solid relationship with owner, Dejphon Chansiri, a man who’s not been heard from publicly in months, but now Bannan admits that it’s not really worth talking to him anymore. Because there are no answers to his questions anyway.
“If I really wanted to get in touch with the chairman I could,” he explained. “In the past if I’ve needed to then he’s made time. But recently it’s felt like I don’t really need to speak to him anymore, because it’s the same answers - nothing is changing… It’s a hard one, because I know that everyone looks at me as the captain, but people sometimes forget that my job is to play football and lead by example. And that’s on the pitch.
“It’s been a long time now, seven months it’s been going on for, and we’re all in the same boat. The boys know that the answers aren’t there, they’re always the same. You just get to the point where we’ve just to sit and wait and see what happens. But at the same time we’ve got a job to do, and we’ve got to give our all for ourselves and the staff.”
And boy have they been giving their all. Before the season started the Owls were odds-on not just to be relegated, but to finish dead last. Many questioned whether they’d even be able to win a game at all. Today, as they prepare to face Coventry City, they’re unbeaten in three and were seconds away from adding a win over Birmingham City on top of their victory at Portsmouth.
“It’s kind of built up a siege mentality with the group”
It's a young side, a threadbare one that’s giving everything for the cause. On Tuesday night they did so 24 hours after being told that they wouldn’t be paid the money that was owed to them, and given no timeline as to when that might change. Bannan couldn’t be prouder.
“I spoke after the game in the changing room and thanked them,” he said. “I told them how proud I was of them - as people and to have them as my teammates. Don’t get me wrong, we could find excuses to not be at our best, and it’d be so easy to not give your all and not give your all.
“But in the huddle before the game I spoke about being role models for their kids. A lot of the boys are parents now, and I asked how they’d want their kids to react to things like this. I also spoke about who we’re representing - each other, ourselves, and the fans. And the staff on the sidelines as well. It’s kind of built up a siege mentality with the group, and I’m lucky to have a team and a changing room that respects me so much and will follow me.
“I can’t praise them enough, because I know that this isn’t a normal way of reacting to things like this - but it’s an amazing way to react. It sets you up for life, too, it makes you a stronger person - at home or on the pitch. I’m proud of every single one of them, staff included. It’s a nightmare, but it doesn’t change our jobs. When you start out in football you want to make people proud, whether it’s your family, the fans, or whoever you’re playing for. And that doesn’t change because you’re not getting paid.”
Unfortunately the players aren’t the only ones not getting paid, though. Staff members have only been given a portion of their monthly salary, and that’s this month. There have been points recently where they’ve not been paid at all, and that’s not something that sits right with the club captain or his teammates. It concerns them deeply.
“It’s hard, because you know what society is like nowadays. People don’t talk. They don’t speak out, so you’re never going to know who’s really struggling. It’s a pride kind of thing where you maybe can’t say that you’re struggling for money, so a lot of people could be bottling things up - and we don’t know. It takes a lot for people to come out and speak about that, so it can be difficult to gauge who is struggling and who’s not. Even with the players, maybe not everyone can tell me how they really feel, so there could be players as well.
“These are the people that make football clubs...”
“But us as players should be ok to deal with a few late payments here and there… Not that it’s acceptable, but we can get by. But these people that I’m talking about - the cleaners, the kitmen, the chefs, staff at the stadium and the club shop, it’s all different for them. They’re not in the same boat, and it’s worrying. These are the people that make football clubs, and they’ve been here for years. So it’s hard to see them struggling, and that affects us more than ourselves not getting paid.”
So they try to just get on with it. Bannan is 35, Liam Palmer is 34, they’ve seen it all over the years. Now, though, they’re sometimes taking to the field with players literally half their age as Henrik Pedersen continues to try and use every tool in his toolbox. For some it might be daunting, seeing so many of the next generation alongside you, but Bannan draws from it.
“It’s weird,” he explained with a chuckle. “Because when you’re at a football club and playing every week, you tend to just think you’re the same. They actually make me feel younger, to be honest. You just fit in with the people you surround yourself with, so we’ve got a lot of young kids at the minute and I don’t really feel any different. Obviously when it gets highlighted it can make you feel a bit old, but I don’t really look at it that way.
“I still feel young, I don’t feel like I’ve lost anything in my game over my career - I feel like I’ve kept most of my things, if not all of them. I’ve had some niggles, but that’s football if you’re going to put in these kinds of minutes. But no, I feel great and I’ve got four goal involvements - I just need to continue that through the season. I need to try and hit good figures, because the situation we find ourselves in at the minute is going to be difficult, and I need to be as much of a talisman as a I can. I need to try and carry the baton as captain.”
What comes next? Nobody knows. The chairman has been charged by the English Football League, as has the club itself. There’s hope for an Independent Football Regulator and what it can achieve, but a points deduction before any of that feels inevitable considering the volume of breaches under Chansiri of late.
Bannan’s response when asked about a possible deduction is typical of the man. Keep going, affect what you can affect. Keep carrying that baton. ‘Til the wheels fall off.
“The points deduction obviously looks like it will come. So we’re trying to just get as many points on board as we can up until that comes - or doesn’t. If it does then we’ll reassess, if it doesn’t then we’ll just try our best to stay in the league. Even without a points deduction we knew it was going to be a tough test, so points deduction or not our aim is to stay in the league. But obviously it’ll be made harder if it comes, it’s hard to think about it though because nobody knows. We just want to put ourselves in as good a place as we can.”
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