"I am not happy with this" Danny Röhl flips record Sheffield Wednesday have been praised for
Praise has been showered on Sheffield Wednesday for their happy knack of winning points from losing positions this season - but speaking after they picked up another in a draw with Preston North End on Saturday, Danny Röhl looked at things a little differently.
The Owls have won more points than any other Championship side this season having gone behind, their tally of 11 including three away wins and ranking two points higher than next-best Bristol City. In the entirety of last season, Wednesday’s come-from-behind points tally was just five and it is their highest since the 2016/17 season in which they raised 15.
But only five teams have gone behind more often than the ninth-placed Wednesday and it is that habit that Röhl wants to break. Though he has praised the mentality shown in doing so, he feels his side must start games better in order to take more control of their fate.
Speaking after a draw with Preston North End in which he faced rumblings of criticism for his initial team selection and admitted he could have made more than the three half-time substitutions he employed after a sluggish first half outing, Röhl said: “I am not happy with this.
“We came back against Cardiff, Preston, at Coventry, at Derby. You can say ‘Oh, great mentality’, but if you always have to come back, it takes so much energy. It’s better when you score and lead because then the opponent has to come and we can make the counter attacks. It makes it a different thing. We know what is possible.
“Again, for my taste there were too many changes that I had to do today. I wish that in the next games we can keep one structure and keep going because that will mean it works well. In the last two games it was subs, shapes. It means there is something wrong.”
Röhl commented on his feeling the basics have been missing from some of Wednesday’s first half displays, particularly in home matches where their recent form has been patchy. Teams come to Hillsborough to scrap matches out, he suggested, and the Owls must find a way to grip the momentum of those challenges earlier than they have done.
“You need a unit, a togetherness,” he said. “After Derby we spoke about this, the character and the mentality is right at the end. It is the reason we take points from being 1-0 down. But I wish for us to have the right mindset at the start of the game. Derby and Preston have both started on the front foot and in this league it is the difference. Preston and Derby know what they have to do and we need to understands our basics and what we have to do at first. Then we can start to play our nice football, create chances, ball possession. Hopefully we learn soon.”