Step into Hillsborough on any match day, and an Owls fan will be ready to talk to you about Chris Waddle.
The winger played for Spurs, Marseille, Newcastle, and Bradford, but he is perhaps most loved at Sheffield Wednesday. Between 1992 and 1996, he played 147 times for the club, scoring 15 goals.
He was voted Football Writers Player of the Year in 1993, the only time a Wednesday player has won the award. It was his debut season following a £1m move from Olympic Marseille, and it came after he won the League Cup with the Owls and helped them to the FA Cup final. He is revered by the blue half of Sheffield, where they regularly sang ‘Walking in a Waddle Wonderland’ from the terraces.
He’s been talking exclusively to the Real EFL about the Owls’ chances this season as they look to push on under Danny Rohl. While there are plenty of new faces to come in, Waddle identified an old hand as the key man next season.
“Barry Bannon is still the same,” replied Waddle, who also won 62 caps for England. “He’s obviously a key player, but will he play 90 minutes every week? We don’t know.”
Newer faces will be expected to be fit and firing, and the 63-year-old has picked out two as potential big players for the Owls.
“Jamal Lowe has come in, who’s been around. He’s (Danny Rohl) signed Valery, who we knew at Southampton, brought him from France. I’m sure there’s going to be another five, six, seven players coming in.”
However, Waddle did exercise a word of caution; he doesn’t expect many transfer fees to be made. Instead, he feels the Owls hierarchy will be fishing for free agents, loans and bargains as they look to improve on a challenging campaign last season.
“They’ll not be buying them for the money or what people think; I think it’ll be a lot of free transfers.”
“They’ll probably try and get the goalkeeper back from Brighton, but I don’t know if they can because Brighton might want to keep him this season.”
Waddle, who has also given us his prediction for the Owls this season, to be released on our news podcast on Wednesday, feels there is still much work to do in S6 before the season starts with a winnable game against Plymouth Argyle.
“There’s a lot of work to be done before now and the Plymouth game, the first game of the season. There’s still four or five players to be signed.
“Let’s hope the players who can fit into that system and keep the momentum going off last season.”
The Owls finished 20th last season, three points clear of the final relegation place. However, their form under Danny Rohl was impressive, and they’d have been much higher had they not had such an appealing start.
Sheffield Wednesday fans should keep their eyes peeled later today, as we’ve also got Waddle’s assessment of Owls owner Dejphon Chansiri and his thoughts on Rohl’s future at Hillsborough.
Chris Waddle was speaking on behalf of BoyleSports, who offer the latest Euro 2024 betting
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