Henrik Pedersen praised the backing of the fans today as Wednesday lost out to Southampton at S6.

With the crowd right behind the team, and particularly in the second half when we threatened for a spell to pull the game back to 2-2, Pedersen said after the 3-1 defeat: “It was amazing, you could feel the players felt safe today.

“In the ground, it didn’t matter what happened on the pitch, there was support all the time and the players tried to give back and show all that they can.

“In each little action our players have to do more than what they can to just have a chance of competing and then when there are mistakes, they could feel the unconditional support through the whole game.

“That atmosphere was amazing today.”

The Owls boss added: “I said to the boys before the game, we are not just here to take part, we are here to try and win a game of football.

“We are here to get into plus points, we are here to play good games and why not make a surprise today against Southampton. I think we had a good performance but it was not enough.

“We knew we couldn’t go too high the whole game because we didn’t have the energy with playing three games in six days and they are very good.

“To give away three set-piece goals today is very disappointing because, besides this of course they created, but we were solid defensively.

“The boys played a really strong second half and gave it a real go and at 2-1 there was a possibility.

“Even at 3-1 we still had chances, still created.

“I said to my players, it’s easy to show who you are when everything is going well but to show who you are in the third game in six days, to show your personality and character the way our boys did is very special.”