Wednesday went into Tuesday evening’s game at Millwall without a striker in our starting line-up and ended up on the wrong end of a 2-1 scoreline.
An excellent 20-yarder from Joey Pelupessy just before half-time put us ahead but also masked our lack of attacking ambition.
We rode our luck at times in the opening 45 minutes, with Millwall’s pressing game catching us out on more than one occasion as our far from convincing defence continually tried to play out from the back.
The home side came out strongly after the break and it was no surprise when Lee Gregory headed them level on 52 minutes.
Worse followed 11 minutes later when we paid for more sloppy defending, losing the ball again when in possession and allowing Steve Morison to slot home unmarked from six yards out.
Young defender Jordan Thorniley was injured in an accidental clash in the build-up to the goal – seemingly suffering a head injury from a Millwall player’s boot as he slid in to try to atone for his initial error – and the game was held up for several minutes to allow for medical treatment before Thorniley was stretchered off.
Wednesday brought on Lucas Joao for Thorniley, Adam Reach replaced David Jones soon afterwards and Atdhe Nuhiu came on for Ross Wallace with 11 minutes – plus 13 minutes of added time – remaining.
Suddenly, Wednesday had a far better shape and began to play with more belief against a mediocre Millwall side but it proved to be an attacking intent that was all too late.
It’s a defeat that will have left Wednesday fans questioning why we began with such a defensive starting line-up, leaving two in-form strikers in Joao and Nuhiu and arguably our player of the season, Adam Reach, on the bench.
This latest reverse sees us in 16th position, eight points ahead of the relegation places.