Sheffield Wednesday’s defence looks set to continue to be the subject of changes.

Injury to Di’Shon Bernard may not be the only juggle ahead for Henrik Pedersen’s Sheffield Wednesday back four, with questions raised over whether it might be time to bring a talented young defender out of the firing line.

Gabriel Otegbayo was among the majority of players to suffer a difficult evening in defeat at Notts County, conceding a penalty for the Magpies to open the scoring having replaced the injured Bernard after 14 minutes. The youngster’s handling of the incident was not the first challenging moment of his season, which has seen him feature in every match across all competitions so far. Wednesday lost 2-0 at Meadow Lane, with Jamal Lowe sent off in the second half. Otegbayo was later taken off for Kieran Morrison.

The match came amid reports by The Wednesday Word that National League outfit Hornchurch are deep in talks over a loan move for Otegbayo’s fellow youngster centre-half Ernie Weaver - after a switch to Forest Green Rovers was halted earlier this month amid injury to Ricardo Santos. Owls boss Henrik Pedersen suggested that any loan move out would be evaluated subject to a fresh issue suffered by Bernard in the County match, which is hoped not to be too serious.

Republic of Ireland youth international Otegbayo has received praise for some of his efforts this season but has also made a number of errors. Asked whether he felt the 21-year-old could have done better with the penalty concession at Meadow Lane, Owls boss Pedersen responded: “I think of course if you give a penalty then you don't do it well in the situation, so yes he could.

“But we took him off because we wanted to have Kieran on the pitch, to have one more offensive player, we were 1-0 down, so it was the solution we took... We're working a lot with Gab and his one v one duels, how he has to handle this and this is a very important part of his development.”

The young defender is still at an early stage of his development and asked whether the time had come to take him out of the firing line while he re-collects his form, the Owls boss said simply: “Yes, we evaluate always for every single player what is best for the team first and what is best for the players and we will also evaluate after this game.”

Santos remains injured and Sil Swinkels is still in the late stages of his rehabilitation. It has previously been suggested that Weaver, who is the subject of as of yet unresolved contract talks, has requested to head out on loan. On his immediate future regarding a loan, Pedersen said: “I don't know exactly what the status is. We have spoken about a loan for him but we also need to evaluate the situation for injuries before we can do something.”