What Sheffield Wednesday boss Garry Monk said on Owls fans, 3-5-2 and Kadeem Harris' penalty shout

Reflecting on his side’s return to football, a dramatic 1-1 draw at Hillsborough against Nottingham Forest on Saturday, Monk also reflected on the experience of playing in front of an empty stadium and paid homage to the role the Wednesday crowd could have played in earning his side a ‘deserved’ win.

The Owls set up in a new-look 3-5-2 formation with a side containing no players under contracts that expire at the end of the month. Though all have been offered extensions to see the season out, a number of those players, including top scorer Steven Fletcher and key man Morgan Fox, could walk away from the club after next Sunday’s clash with Bristol City.

Asked whether the system is one Wednesday fans should expect to see more of going forward, Monk admitted it would ultimately depend on the decisions of those players: “I’ll have to see.

“There are other systems we’ve worked on. It will be a case of me assessing the squad as we go along.

“I’ve been trying to work on a few different formations that we need to have in us, because of the non-clarity we’re going to have in terms of out-of-contract players and what might happen. We have to be able to adjust. We might not have certain personnel for certain systems.

“We dominated the ball today offensively, all that was lacking was that final third position.”

A promising performance, rewarded with a last-minute Connor Wickham equaliser, was the first played out in front of an empty crowd following the coronavirus crisis.

And Monk said he felt though his players coped admirably under the circumstances, the crowd’s absence was felt.

“It was different, there’s no denying that. It was strange in certain respects. Had our crowd been in there and as we were pushing in the second half and getting us back into it, the crowd would have pushed us on and given the crowd extra energy. Of course we missed that.

“But we experienced that as players and staff, we’ve played behind-closed-doors games or friendlies, in-house games, pre-season games where there’s no crowd. But it’s the first time for all of us really. I thought we dealt with the situation well.

“The minimum we deserved was a draw.”

Monk felt Wednesday deserved a penalty for a late foul on Kadeem Harris and admitted the side’s ‘rustiness’ going forward cost them.

He said: “What let us down today was our final third decisions, we got in so many great situations in the final third and we looked a little bit rusty and we could have made more of that, but overall we controlled the game with possession and defensively we didn’t suffer too much.

“One lapse obviously cost us that goal which was disappointing, but we had opportunities to take that lead.”

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