“Mate, I am choked..” Tearful Brian Laws summary sums up an emotional night with Sheffield Wednesday

Because former Sheffield Wednesday manager Brian Laws summed up what it was to be at Hillsborough on Thursday evening after one of the great sporting comebacks in memory.

Together with BBC Radio Sheffield pair Rob Staton and Andy Giddings, he was handed a task perhaps even more impossible than the one that had faced the Owls at 8pm – doing the piece justice. To the backdrop of a pitch invasion and supporters around them in floods of tears, the three of them produced a run of audio that did just that.

In print, the words don’t do the piece justice.

“Oh wow,” said Laws, a football veteran of Brian Clough glory days and Premier League managerial stints, his voice quivering with the sheer magnitude of what he had just witnessed.

“If this doesn’t give them the momentum to go on to Wembley and win it, what will? This is just the most remarkable story I’ve ever seen in my career. I’ve been in the game for over 40 years.

“Sometimes nothing surprises me in football, but this is breathless. It’s taken my breath away. I’m emotional, really emotional.

“The players have been hurting all week. They’ve kept their silence but they knew they had to do something – they had to repay the fans who have wanted and craved for this.

“The stories that sometimes football brings to you, this is one of the most unbelievable, memorable games we’ll ever see. When you feel the emotion from the fans and how they are on the pitch? Oh, wow.”

Recognising the emotion in Laws’ throat, Staton teed the 61-year-old up after what has been a hugely challenging week for current Wednesday manager Darren Moore.

Not many know the pressures of football management and after weeks of adversity, criticism and in one case racial abuse on social media, Laws spoke passionately on the human side to Moore’s achievement.

“Mate, I am choked,” he said. “I’m more choked because of the emotions for Darren, what he’s gone through personally. Achieving 96 points and looking like he was going to be dumped out, possibly even sacked. You hear rumours going round.

“If this hasn’t brought a closeness and a warmth to Darren Moore, what can you do?”

It still doesn’t feel real – that after all that came before, Wednesday will make the trip to Wembley for a May 28 match-up that could see them return to the Championship after the most remarkable rollercoaster of a campaign.

Laws continued: “Listen, you talk about records to be broken.

“You’ve got Sheffield Wednesday who have broken the record of 23 games unbeaten, they’ve broken the record of 96 points, broken a record in terms of clean sheets. You look at all that – they’ve broken another record tonight. It’s just incredible.

“They deserve to go to Wembley. This is one of those moments in life that you remember – ‘What about that comeback?’ It’s never been seen before. This is incredible, I’ve never seen anything like it before.

“All the plaudits have to come out. Credit where it is due. What a man, Darren Moore. What a man.”

You can listen to last night’s post-match coverage, including Laws’ emotional summation of a remarkable evening HERE.

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