Alarming data drop behind Danny Röhl's Sheffield Wednesday selection decision

A home tie against non-league Maidstone United served as a dangling carrot for both sides, though with a monster clash with fellow relegation battlers Birmingham City scheduled for Friday evening, the German had already made clear the side named for the cup clash would be much-changed.

Quite how changed remained to be seen and Wednesday made no fewer than nine switches to the side that lost at Huddersfield Town over the weekend. Against a full-strength Coventry, a valiant scrap in the first half saw the Owls enter the break at 1-1 before Coventry's added quality and match sharpness shone through to produce a knockout flurry of three goals in eight minutes to return a 4-1 scoreline that flattered nobody.

Youngsters Gui Siqueira, Joey Phuthi and Sam Reed all made formative steps into match action, MacKenzie Maltby was named as an unused substitute, while the likes of Jeff Hendrick and Reece James made rare appearances. At centre-half, Di'Shon Bernard replaced Akin Famewo at half-time in a load-sharing exercise, while regular starter Anthony Musaba was taken off at the hour mark.

What inspired the scale of overhaul to the line-up was a steep drop in running output seen from their goalless draw with Watford last midweek to their forlorn defeat at Huddersfield Town on Saturday. Wednesday have adopted a high-intensity philosophy under Röhl and are rarely out-run by their opponents. That wasn't the case at the John Smiths Stadium, which served as the second of a run of three away matches on the spin in which the Owls have conceded four goals.

Röhl told The Star: "We have this challenge, we had to job share Akin and Di'Shon, that was clear; 45 minutes and 45 minutes. We had to do this because we need 100 per cent freshness. I looked at the data after Huddersfield and we ran 7km less than the opponent. Usually we are always running more and sprinting more. This is what we have to do and for this we need fresh legs and fresh minds.

"We have invested a lot and we invested a lot against Watford, a good game. You feel it and it drops down. We were not quick enough in the mind and in the legs and this is the reason I selected this squad. Of course we have the goal to come into the next round and we showed something in the first half, but you look to the result; 4-1, four conceded goals. This is too much."

Röhl has asked for ultimate energy from the changing room to the terraces for the visit of Birmingham, who sit nine points beyond them in the Championship table and whose scalp seems all the more vital following defeat in West Yorkshire last time out. Röhl continued: "We had a plan to bring some players out on 45 or 60 minutes, with complete focus ahead to the Birmingham game. This is what we have to do. We will prepare this from tomorrow (Wednesday) and then we will go."