Sheffield Wednesday star reveals ‘only going to beat ourselves’ motto for the Owls

The Owls picked up a 3-0 win over Cheltenham Town on Saturday as they maintained their third-place spot in League One, and ‘Icky’ was again a solid influence in defence alongside current partner, Ben Heneghan.

Wednesday have been guilty of being their own worst enemy on occasion this season, and while the former Rotherham United defender thinks that they’re making progress – he does appear to agree with one of Darren Moore’s mottos.

“If you want to get promoted in this league, clean sheets are massive,” he told The Star at the weekend. “We’ve looked at the goals we’ve conceded this season, and the gaffer’s got a saying: We’re only going to beat ourselves in this league.

“When we lose games you can look at every goal and say what was wrong, and we’ve had a lot of avoidable goals, but it’s about learning from your mistakes and looking back and learning from them.

“You don’t want to be seeing the same mistakes over and over again, that brings complacency. There were a lot of new faces in the summer, and it takes time to gel sometimes, and everyone is getting to know each other.”

Only David Stockdale (1170) has played more league minutes than Ihiekwe (1153) so far in 2022/23 for the Owls, and – as an experienced campaigner in the third tier – he knows exactly what it takes to get out of this division.

“We have to worry about ourselves,” he went on to say. “As individuals and as a team. You can’t take any team for granted in this league… If you take them for granted then you’ll get punished in this league, it doesn’t matter who you play. You have to have humility, and that’s how you build consistency.

“You can control performances, you can’t control the score. But if you’re going to score goals, even if it’s 1-0, sometimes that’ll be enough.”

The 29-year-old is one of only four players to have featured in all 13 games for Wednesday this season, and he’ll no doubt be expecting to keep his place for the trip to Cambridge United this weekend.

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