A Sheffield Wednesday old boy has confirmed he is in discussions to bring an outgoing Owls favourite to his current club having already signed him on two previous occasions.

David Downes swapped Wednesday for Blackpool last summer, stepping up into the role of sporting director at Bloomfield Road, and is busy setting the club up for a League One promotion tilt next season having already signed one ex-Owl in Jordan Rhodes.

Speaking at a recent fan forum, the ex-Wednesday transfer chief laid bare the club’s interest in signing George Byers on a permanent basis. The popular midfielder was confirmed to be leaving S6 after three seasons as part of the Owls’ retained list last month. He spent the second half of last season with the Tangerines and made a positive impact on the club’s supporters.

"It’s difficult to speak about individual players,” Downes said when asked of the scale of interest in Byers and fellow 2023/24 loanee Hayden Coulson. "I’ve signed George Byers twice- once for Sheffield Wednesday and once here, so naturally I know his agent very well so we are in discussions.

"He will have a lot of options, he’s a good player. He’s a free transfer so he’s probably easier to speak about, Hayden is a Middlesbrough player with a year left so ultimately if they do want to give him away and do something with ourselves- we’d definitely be in that discussion to bring him back. Ultimately he does have another year, and a year option.”

In what has been a relatively slow start to the transfer rumour mill for most clubs, things are beginning to move after the opening of the transfer window last week. Wednesday have confirmed the signings of two free agents - Ben Hamer and Max Lowe - and are believed to be closing in on the signing of Angers defender Yan Valery. Blackpool are another club making moves.

"In terms of recruitment, we’ve done a lot of planning so we’re in the execution phase and trying to get one or two over the line,” Downes continued.

"Last summer we all came in at different times, and I like to think in January everything looked more aligned into what we wanted to do. Me and Neil (Critchley - Blackpool manager) have had nine months of working with each other now, we kind of know where we want to be and where we want to get to.