Sheffield Wednesday star performer now in danger of missing Sheffield United clash.
The Steel City derby is looming on the horizon as Sheffield Wednesday and Sheffield United look to claim the first set of footballing bragger’s rights in the city for over seven years.
Both teams will play two further league matches leading into the clash – Wednesday must also factor in a trip to London for a Carabao Cup clash at Brentford on Tuesday – before the Bramall Lane battle on Sunday November 10. The Owls have two home fixtures; Watford and Norwich City, while the Blades face away trips to Blackburn Rovers and Bristol City.
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It comes at the sort of time yellow card suspensions start making themselves known across the EFL and the Owls have players who may well have to tread lightly over the next games if they are to avoid missing out on the trip to Bramall Lane. Players in the EFL are slapped with a one-game ban if they collect five yellow cards before the 19th match of the league season.
Wednesday’s in-form centre-half Di’Shon Bernard picked up his fourth in their comeback victory at Portsmouth on Friday evening, meaning he’ll miss the Norwich match should he be cautioned against Watford – and will miss the derby if his next yellow comes against the Canaries. So far this season, Bernard averages one yellow card every 225 minutes of league football.
The only other Wednesday player in danger of missing out on the derby by virtue of yellow card suspension is Yan Valery. The Owls new boy has picked up three yellow cards to date and will miss out at Bramall Lane should he be booked in both of their next two league outings. A handful of other Owls players are on two yellows.
The Owls beat Pompey to push their form to a run of just one defeat in their last six matches. Manager Danny Röhl has expressed satisfaction with their direction of travel in terms of performances, but knows all too well the frailty of league position in such a busy period of fixtures and has made clear the need to maintain their efforts.
“I said this before,” he said. “What is important is the performance. All the games since QPR we could have won and this is good to see. If we do this in the following weeks we can hold our position or move up, if we don’t we will fall down. For me it is more at the moment about performance than the table position.”
