What has given Sheffield Wednesday star more fire in the belly - and his response to Danny Röhl critics

That’s according to Wednesday skipper Barry Bannan, who speaking to The Star earlier this month described his process in fighting to prove doubters wrong. With other results going against them over the weekend and chances missed to win against Stoke City, the predictor algorithms moved further against the chances of another dramatic late-season success at S6.

With nine points to play for, Wednesday are only one point back on the safety places and will head to Blackburn Rovers this weekend roared on by a bumper crowd. Owls boss Danny Röhl has spoken about the need to take one game at a time - and sees no reason why they can’t take three wins from three.

Bannan said: “When you’re in football, you’re a naturally competitive person and you don’t like losing. I am sure all the boys in there will have the same natural reaction to the critics as me. We’ll all want to prove them wrong.

“It’s part of the reason the boys have got to where they have in football. They’ve all had critics, they’ve got a fire in their belly. Footballers are very competitive people and no matter what they’re doing, they want to prove people wrong. But we need to show that now. Against Middlesbrough we dropped off and it probably didn’t look like we wanted to win, but that result hurt us as much as it did the fans watching. Nobody likes to lose, especially footballers.”

Though from a minority, Röhl’s approach in some games has taken some flack from some fans online in recent weeks, prompting him to defend his record.

“I see quite a bit of it,” Bannan said with a smile. “I have Twitter and sometimes it’s hard not to reply. I’m getting older and wiser and a few years ago I might have replied, but it’s not worth it. You don’t know who is behind the keyboard, it could be a rival fan or anybody.

“You don’t read too much into it. You just have to go out and prove them wrong. It’s football, people have an opinion and whether they mean it or not or whether they’re doing it to get a reaction, you don’t know. It’s the world that we live in at this minute in time.”