Sheffield Wednesday consider training ground options as Dejphon Chansiri plans top-flight era

Owner Dejphon Chansiri has carried out an in-depth ‘root and branch’ review of the Owls, since he purchased the club 12 months ago.

With Carlos Carvalhal’s team currently occupying a play-off spot in the Championship, Wednesday are delivering on the pitch.

And Chansiri is keen to analyse every facet of Wednesday – from whether Hillsborough is fit to host top-flight football to stadium catering – to ensure the Owls can grow off-the-field too and be prepared for top-flight football.

He has already invested £1m on a new Hillsborough pitch, and his ambitions for the Owls have been matched by supporters who have already snapped up more than 14,000 season tickets for next season.

A key area of concern, though, is the club’s historic Middlewood Road training ground – their home since around 1980 – which is outdated, and too small for the demands imposed on a Premier League set-up and Academy system.

“One of the things that the club will need to improve in the future will be the training ground,” said head coach Carvalhal. “We don’t have quantity or too much quality.

“We know that and it is not an excuse. With the conditions we have, we have quality training.

“But to be a club at another level, we know the facilities are not at the level that we need it to be at. The chairman is caring about that. He knows, but he can’t do everything in one minute. Like we can’t build a team in a few weeks or months.

“There are things that the club need to develop and one of the things the club needs to develop is the condition of the pitches, the condition and quantity of the pitches and also the facilities. It is an old building and so too are the pitches but the chairman is caring about that.”

With the heavy rains over recent weeks, the Owls have had to juggle training sessions – using the pitch at Hillsborough on occasions – to cope with the conditions.

It is a problem for Carvalhal, and his players, who admits it is not “perfect conditions”.

“It is not easy at this moment with the quality of the pitches to open them up,” he said.

“The pitches are very bad. We don’t have an opportunity to do exercises with a big group in a big space. We trained at Hillsborough yesterday because it was impossible to train on our pitches. We trained today on our pitches. We are trying to do our best. We know we don’t have the perfect conditions.

“We know that the chairman has only been at the club a short time so he can’t do everything in one minute. What he has done is absolutely fantastic.”

Asked if the Owls could quit Middlewood Road, Carvalhal told The Yorkshire Post: “I don’t know. You must talk with the chairman.”

This is not the first time Wednesday have considered leaving Middlewood Road.

In 2004, then chairman Dave Allen wanted to sell the training ground to property developers for £10m and move to the south of the city.

Chansiri’s investment in a new pitch has already reaped dividends. Last season, Wednesday won just five Championship games on a poor playing surface, but this year the Owls have lost just once – against Middlesbrough – and their unbeaten run stretches over five months.

Tomorrow, they face Brentford and a win could cut the gap on the top two – and automatic promotion – to just three points.

That has seen a surge in expectation levels amongst excited Owls fans, but Carvalhal said: “We know that people are excited but me, my group and the staff have all their feet on the floor.”