Play-offs memories – from the managers and players who were there

When Sheffield Wednesday trailed Peterborough United 4-0 after the first leg of their League One play-off semi-final in 2023, it seemed like it was all over for the Owls.

Boss Darren Moore was not convinced though, so much so that he had his team preparing for all possibilities in the second leg.

“When I came in on the Monday, we finished training and I started taking penalty kicks with the boys,” he said.

“The looks I got… but what I did was I got into them psychologically. They were finishing the pens they were taking, but they were proving to me they could score.

“The second day, I got all the academy staff out and I had them waving banners behind the goal. On the Wednesday, we went down to Hillsborough and this time I’d done it under a chorus of boos over the tannoy.”

It worked.

The Owls fought back to take the game into extra time, and came back again to go to penalties. From then on, practice made perfect and five superb spot-kicks later they sealed a place in the final against Barnsley.

“It was the easiest team talk,” said Moore. “I said, ‘lads, we are prepared for this’.

“If you look at the five kicks that they took, they were absolutely sublime. The work over the four or five days, the intensity to make sure everything was possible, that we were going to leave it on the pitch, was achieved.”