Borner blunder sets Owls on the road to another defeat

Last updated : 07 March 2021 By C. Morris

Red card leads to loss against Royals

Sheffield Wednesday suffered a 6th straight defeat on Saturday, going down to a 3-0 defeat away to promotion chasing Reading.

Darren Moore made two changes to the side that were defeated by Rotherham United in midweek, Urhoghide and Harris coming in for Penney and Reach. The Owls gave as good as they got in the early stages and went closest to taking the lead when Lees saw his header from a Harris corner rebound off the crossbar.

The pivotal moment came just after the half-hour mark when Borner played a poor pass out of defence which was pounced upon by Puscas. As the Reading forward advanced towards the penalty area, Borner compounded his error by pulling the striker down inside the box, resulting in a penalty for the home side and a red card for the Owls defender.

Olise made no mistake from the spot to give the Royals the lead and from that point on it looked like there would be no way back for Wednesday. Indeed, it seemed as though Darren Moore thought the same as he substituted captain Barry Bannan for Matt Penney, seemingly saving the legs of the midfielder for future games to come.

Reading dominated the remainder of the game, former Owls forward Lucas Joao almost doubled the lead in the first five minutes of the second half, clipping the bar from a corner and it was the Portuguese striker who did make 2-0 on 65 minutes, side-footing past Wildsmith after taking a pass from Yiadom.

Wednesday were unable to offer any kind of threat as their hosts took full advantage of their extra man and Yiadom made it 3-0 with three minutes to go, placing a low drive across Wildsmith into the corner of the goal.

The Owls remain 7 points adrift of safety in the Championship relegation zone. Perhaps the only consolation for new boss Moore is that they have a rare week without a midweek fixture, allowing him a full week on the training ground as they prepare to face league leaders Norwich City at Hillsborough next Sunday.