How Danny Röhl stamped his authority on Sheffield Wednesday from day one

The then-34-year-old German breezed through the doors of Hillsborough to take over the club’s worst-ever start to an EFL campaign with an air of confidence. With the odds stacked heavily against them, a first win of the season at the 14th attempt set things in motion and Wednesday went on to seal survival on the very last day of a mammoth effort at Sunderland earlier this month.

Röhl made a hugely positive impression at S6 in his first weeks and instantly garnered the support of all those around S6 - even as his side won only one of his first seven matches. Improvements in approach and confidence grew and before long Wednesday were seen as an entirely different side to the one that started the season, with opposition managers coming to accept in press conferences that the Owls were in what felt like a false position in the table.

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It might seem odd to some to acknowledge the fact Röhl arrived a relative unknown to those without a true knowledge of German football when he took over from Xisco. But it was a calm and confident manner that got Owls players on board after 11 winless matches in a miserable start to their camapign.

“He was the same age as me and he's never managed a club,” Bannan said. “He's obviously worked with some of the best players of the world so I didn't really think of that at the time. But looking back now, I thought he would be a bit shy. It was a new language, his first ever job as the leader of a club. But his confidence was really, really high and you could see that what he was saying he believed in.

“He said that if we listened to him and did what he wanted us to do, we could celebrate at the end of the season. Numerous times this season we've had big games that haven't gone our way and you thought maybe you could see us going down, he's brought it all up and he's never panicked. He's got us into the position we're in now and a lot of that is down to him, but it's the players as well, the players have been brilliant.”