Stuart Gray was full of praise for Keiren Westwood’s performance in the 1-1 draw at Leeds today.
The keeper produced some excellent stops to prevent the home side taking the lead during a first 45 minutes which Gray said “wasn’t like us” and he said the team had Westwood to thank for the goalless scoreline at half-time.
Westwood continued to deny Leeds after the break and Gray added: “I’m gutted for Keiren today because if anyone deserves a clean sheet for the performance than it is him.”
He said Leeds closed Wednesday down in the opening half, leading to us giving the ball away too easily and pointed to poor ball retention up front.
Gray said: “It was more like us in the second-half, we passed the ball around with a tempo and intensity and we were causing them some problems.”
He also pointed to Stevie May’s missed opportunity at 1-0 as a big moment, saying:
“If Stevie scores, I think we could then have picked them off.” However, he added that a draw was probably a fair result.
Chris Maguire and Jose Semedo were both substituted soon after being booked, as Gray felt Leeds were trying to get them sent off, and Maguire will now miss the home game with Watford on October 18 as his fifth booking means an automatic one-match ban.
Reflecting on the Owls beginning to the season, going into the second international break, Gray said we have made a decent start but we cannot get complacent.
He was full of praise for the players to date and, in terms of room for improvement, pointed to the need for more goals and for more winning form at Hillsborough to match our away record.