Why Sheffield Wednesday may struggle in any Mark McGuinness transfer hunt

The 22-year-old centre back played 17 League One games for the Owls in 2022/23 before he was recalled by Cardiff City, but many feel that his exit had a major role to play in the club’s fall-off in form that meant they required the play-offs to reach the Championship.

In a recent Owls survey – which had over 1300 responses – 85.2% of voters said that they’d like to see him back at Hillsborough next season, and there’s no doubt that Darren Moore would’ve jumped at the chance to get him back on board if he’d not surprisingly parted ways by mutual consent on Monday night.

McGuinness thoroughly enjoyed his time at Hillsborough prior to his return to Cardiff, and was even reportedly spotted watching his former teammates at Wembley as they saw off Barnsley last month.

But a deal would have been tough to strike with the Bluebirds even if Moore had remained considering the former Arsenal youngster played every single minute of their campaign after arriving back in Wales, and with a year left on his contract still his current club hold all the cards.

Suggestions are that – as things stand – Cardiff have no intentions of selling the talented defender, and with Wednesday likely to be a rival of some sort next season it has probably made the likelihood of a deal being done even slimmer.

With Moore gone, the task becomes even more difficult, and whether his replacement likes McGuinness or not there may be an acceptance that they can’t get him even if they wanted to.