Sheffield Wednesday are deliberating over the signing of experienced striker Lyle Taylor, with Owls manager Xisco Muñoz revealing that the club needs more time to think about the proposed deal, in comments taken from the Wednesday press conference briefing ahead of the Sunderland match on Friday.
The 33-year-old striker last played in the EFL during the 2021-22 season, featuring for both Nottingham Forest and Birmingham City at Championship level.
Before that, he also played in the second tier for Charlton in a spell that he will fondly remember – Taylor scoring an impressive 11 goals in just 21 starts for the Addicks during the 2019-20 season before a move to Forest materialised.
The Monserrat international has been a trialist with Wednesday recently, with the striker spotted in the stands at Hillsborough on occasion also.
It remains to be seen whether or not Taylor will become an Owls player, but those with Wednesday connections will hope he does join to give the winless Owls more firepower up top.
Horrendous Start For Muñoz
It was always going to be a tough job for the Spaniard from the get-go, joining Sheffield Wednesday after the unexpected departure of popular former boss Darren Moore from Hillsborough.
On top of that, Wednesday arguably didn’t bolster their ranks adequately for the step-up to the second tier this summer – a number of loanees and free transfers joining the building over high-quality additions.
It has shown on the pitch, with Wednesday yet to pick up a win in the Championship this season at the time of writing with six losses from eight played.
Muñoz’s men have been poor in attack too, only scoring five times this campaign so far which is the lowest in the entire division.
It’s no surprise therefore that rumours indicating Taylor could sign for the Owls are welcomed with open arms in South Yorkshire, an experienced attacker at the level who has scored 156 goals in total during his lengthy career.
What’s Been Said?
Speaking ahead of Friday night’s clash versus Sunderland, Xisco Muñoz took questions on all sorts with the conversation focussing on Lyle Taylor at one point and whether he will sign for Wednesday after being a trialist.
Muñoz said: “It has been a short time; I need more time (to make a decision).”
The under pressure Spaniard also took questions on his job security, Wednesday away fans chanting for the Owls boss to go after a heavy defeat to Swansea.
He added: “We can change nothing in the past, but learn from our mistakes and right now, our big focus is towards Friday night.
We have made some big mistakes sometimes. We need to find the balance, one of the key things in the Championship is to try and find the clean sheets and arrive in more dangerous situations for our strikers.
We are looking at these situations where we need to improve and can only say we are so sorry for our start. It’s not the start what we want and what the fans want – and we need to say sorry for that.”
Writer’s View
It’s fair to say the environment at Hillsborough currently is toxic, the feel-good factor of Darren Moore has been lost and has been replaced with Xisco Muñoz who looks powerless to what is going on around him.
One victory could change things drastically, but the Wednesday fans have seemingly already had enough of their new boss after only a few months of having him as manager.
Muñoz could look towards signing Lyle Taylor as a way to fix the poor attacking displays from Wednesday so far this season, an experienced player who could well lead the line and spearhead some positive results for a team who desperately needs them.
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