Seriously, what the hell has happened to Sheffield Wednesday? And what next?

We’ve spoken a great deal about stats this season; about clean sheet records, unbeaten runs and whether or not the Owls could break the 100-point mark. As mad as it sounds, at one stage the latter seemed almost inevitable, such was the brutal surety of what Darren Moore’s Wednesday were building.

This wasn’t the Wednesday bubble drunk on win after win. Onlookers from around the country were commenting on just how ruthless and snarling the Owls had become; regional journalists, well-known football pundits, opposition managers.

The stat now doing the rounds? A run of one win in eight. And the conversation from those same onlookers – and indeed from those of us working a little closer to the club on a more regular basis – is one of complete perplexion.

How can the foundations such a promising league position was built on turn to sand so quickly? The very things that made Wednesday so good – a rugged ability to control games, ice-cool defence, know-how, composure – have deserted them to differing extents in this last month. Five teams placed 12th or lower have taken points from them since a March 11 win at Fratton Park that was one of the finest displays of grit and efficiency you could wish to witness.

We’ve seen ‘wheels off’ scenarios across a range of sports. Perhaps its because we’ve got all a front row seat, but this one feels especially remarkable.

Such is the nature of the world we live in – exacerbated by social media – that there seems to be a rabid clamour for a single figure or incident to blame the downturn on. Everything must be simple and clear-cut; January, injuries, the dugout. Well which one is it? Which one?! Pick one!!!

It’s nonsense. As was the case during long periods of success, it’s down to a collective, the perfect storm of factors from the top to the middle to the bottom.

That includes, by the way, a squad of players put together specifically to deal with the sort of adversity they seem to be melting under right now. Injuries or no injuries, the chest-out cojones evident on trips to Portsmouth and Wycombe and so on? They aren’t evident right now.

Any need for nitty-gritty postmortems comes later. And besides, the body isn’t cold yet. In fact Wednesday’s season – while praying for the twist of all twists – is not dead, even if the task has in all likelihood heartbreakingly shifted from title dreams to preparation for a play-off campaign they have already qualified for.

We’re not footballers. Watching on, all we can do is hope for that one last monumental twist, or for Wednesday to regain form and some semblance of momentum heading into the chaos of those playoffs.

Darren Moore’s assertion post-match at Burton Albion was simple, that the only way to turn things around is to win football matches. As he’s said a few times, that’s been the task all along.

For all the noise, for all the disappointment, it’s Moore, his staff and his players that must get back to doing exactly that.

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