With just one win picked up from their last five Championship games, Danny Rohl‘s Sheffield Wednesday continue to fall short of the second-tier playoff spots.
If the Owls were to string together a patch of positive results, they could still leap into those coveted top six spots, with the South Yorkshire outfit only three points off Blackburn Rovers who hold that final position in the playoff picture.
For now, Rohl will just have to make do with how inconsistent his side can be, with the potential for promotion to still be on the cards if a number of his top performers turn on the style between now and the close of the campaign.
The numbers behind Sheffield Wednesday’s top performers
The most obvious place to start here is with top scorer Josh Windass who is enjoying one of his finest seasons to date donning Wednesday blue and white.
Windass has already surpassed his second-tier goal tally from last season this time around, with the former Rangers man now up to ten league strikes from 29 games, compared to a lesser total of six when Wednesday were battling against the drop.
One of those goals even saw the entertaining 31-year-old score from inside his own half on New Year’s Day, with Rohl hopeful that more moments of magic like this audacious strike from his number 11 can see the Owls sneak into playoff contention.
He will also be well aware that other attackers will have to step up to the mark too, with Michael Smith another face that has been a source of goals this campaign so far.
Despite being regularly linked with a move away from South Yorkshire, the experienced EFL head boasts an impressive record of seven goals and four assists from only ten league starts.
There is also Barry Bannan of course who is a spectacular star on his day with four goals from 29 league encounters, but the Scotsman could now face a long time out on the sidelines owing to injury.
To add further insult to injury, there is one attacker who left Hillsborough in the summer and he is now outscoring both Bannan and Smith in League One surroundings.
The ex-Sheffield Wednesday man now outscoring Smith and Bannan
During Wednesday’s recent promotion heroics up to the second tier, the aforementioned Smith was often helped up top by an equally deadly partner.
Lee Gregory now finds himself back at the level where he shone with the Owls and it’s as if the 36-year-old has never been away judging by his lethal campaign to date with Mansfield Town.
|
Gregory’s goal record in L1 by season |
|||
|---|---|---|---|
|
Season |
Team |
Games played |
Goals scored |
|
24/25 |
Mansfield |
20 |
10 |
|
22/23 |
Wednesday |
38 |
10 |
|
21/22 |
Wednesday |
36 |
16 |
|
16/17 |
Millwall |
37 |
17 |
|
15/16 |
Millwall |
41 |
18 |
|
Sourced by Transfermarkt |
|||
Looking at the table above, Gregory is ageing like a fine wine under Nigel Clough’s wing at the Stags, with a sublime ten goals coming his way from 20 League One encounters.
Amazingly, that means the veteran centre-forward has already matched his 2022/23 output for Wednesday from 18 fewer clashes, whilst also managing to better both Smith and Bannan’s 2024/25 numbers when lining up with confidence at Field Mill.
He was the division’s leading goalscorer during the fledgling stages of the season, with the “outstanding” 36-year-old – as he was once heralded by Rohl for his attitude behind the scenes – continuing to show there’s life in his legs still after walking away from Hillsborough on a free transfer.
It’s unlikely that Wednesday hold many lingering regrets over the way Gregory departed the club though, considering the ageing striker was in dire need of game-time.
The German will just pray there’s enough in his team’s tank to challenge for the playoffs for the rest of the campaign, whilst Gregory aims to keep putting in some top goalscoring displays in the division below.
Related
Championship Table: Latest standings for the 2024/25 season
Latest English Football League Championship standings 2024/25.
