‘I love you, have no regrets’ – History repeats for team Windass as Sheffield Wednesday star Josh looks to follow dad’s Wembley heroics

Opening a text from his partner, he read three words that made his heart skip a beat; ‘They’re battering them.’

It was May 18 2023 and all those miles away, his son Josh was playing his part in one of the greatest football comebacks of all-time. The world watched on agog as Liam Palmer equalised, as Callum Paterson equalised again and as Jack Hunt slipped the winning penalty into the top corner.

An award-winning after dinner speaker, Windass Snr was doing a turn in Blackpool. In truth, a large part of his mind was in Sheffield and though those tuning in on television watched on in bewildered awe, the mind of an experienced football man knew what was going down.

“I’ve seen and witnessed a lot of things in football,” Dean told The Star. “Josh told me that Peterborough had a bit of a lack of experience with a lot of young lads in the team. It said to me that if they could get to 2-0 at half-time they’d pull it round.

“Hillsborough is a big stage for young kids and I thought they might crumble if they could go in at two.

“Football is a very strange game and sometimes it comes down to whoever has the bottle. That’s the case on Monday, too.”

Jumping into his car and setting off back down the M62 to East Yorkshire, he must have looked quite the sight, screaming back at Talksport’s coverage of the match as if he were in the Kop.

“I only got the extra-time and penalties on the radio,” he said. “The anxiety was going through the roof!”

When Josh walks out under the arch on Monday, he’ll be the second member of his family to do so.

Dean’s winning volley for his hometown club Hull City in the 2008 Championship play-off final is one of the iconic moments to take place in the new stadium and gave him another shot at the Premier League at the age of 39.

He believes Wednesday’s arsenal of experienced players can make a difference when it comes to which team is best placed to handle the pressure of the occasion, but that the game will be boiled down to much more than that. Young or old, he says, you don’t know how each player will react until the sun is beating down on them.

“I’ve said to Josh – that place does strange things to people,” he said.

“Players know it’s not just a game of football. Players know how much money these games mean to football clubs. Football is now a business and it’s all about revenue and finance. I don’t know what the prize is for League One but it’ll be a lot of money, it’s not just a game of football like any other Saturday or Tuesday night.

“It’s the biggest game a lot of lads will play in their careers and it does do strange things to people.

“Wembley was the best moment of my life apart from my lads being born. I was a local lad which made it even more special. My story is different to Josh’s at Sheffield Wednesday but my god it was a great occasion.

“I said to him the other day, ‘You play the game. If you play the occasion you’ll get wrapped up in it and it will pass you by. You have to focus on the 90 minutes of football.’

“But it’s not just a game of football, this. It’s about people’s livelihoods and that’s why the play-offs are so special.”

Windass will take his place in the stands on Monday, choosing not to – as he puts it – ‘prawn sandwich it’. He’ll be the proudest bag of nerves in the borough.

Dean’s now sadly deceased dad John was not a great traveller, choosing to watch the game with friends at a working man’s club in Hull the day Windass secured Hull a historic promotion.

But a proud bag of nerves he was, too, something Dean’s otherwise typically rough-and-tumble demeanour wobbles on a touch when regaling the story.

“We have our fall-outs me and Josh and we always have done,” he said. “My Dad didn’t come to Wembley that day. But his mates told me he was sat there like King Kong.

“Andy Cole will be the same with [Barnsley forward] Devante. It’ll go one way or the other. Thankfully that day went my way and hopefully Monday will go Josh’s way.

“The one thing that gets you as a parent, as a dad, as an ex-footballer? I can’t affect the game. I could do that when I played, but I can’t do that when I’m watching Josh.

“League games or anything, I probably get more nervous now than I did when I was playing.

“He’s done very well, he’s a very good footballer and what a stage to go and tell the world how good you are.”

With his old Bradford City teammate Darren Moore – with whom he shared another promotion to the Premier League in 1999 – in the technical area, he’ll have further skin in the game. But his focus will be centred squarely on the blue and white number 11 shirt.

If Josh manages to follow a unique family tradition, King Kong will present himself once more in the Wembley stands on Monday afternoon.

“I’ve not spoken to Josh this week,” Dean said. “I’ve just text him. He’s doing his thing and getting himself ready and I don’t want to distract him. He’s sorted his tickets out, he’s sorted his family out and he’s done all that that you need to do.

“The text said, ‘I love you, don’t walk off that pitch with any regrets and go get me the winning goal.’ That’s all I put.

“As my old mate Darren said on the video we’ve all seen on Twitter, it’s one more game. One more game. That’s all it is now.”

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