Owls hit by financial realities in battle to avoid the drop

Jones is desperate to bring in at least one striker during the January transfer window and the reasons why were all too obvious as the Owls spurned a glut of missed chances in their 0-0 stalemate with Wolves on Saturday.

The Owls manager had been working on a deal to sign an unnamed reserve player from a Premier League team, only for a Championship rival to steam in and offer £22,000 weekly wages.

Jones was stunned when he was quoted £2.5m for another target, and said the Owls will not be held to ransom over potential signings.

“I have got to move people out, to bring people in. It’s as simple as that,” said Jones, who allowed Daniel Jones to leave last week to join Port Vale.

“I was told one lad would cost £2.5m. I cannot compete with that. One club in this division is going to pay £22,000 (per week) for a striker. He’s not even in a Premier League first team and hasn’t been for a while.

“That’s what they are prepared to pay. Everybody is chasing the Holy Grail (promotion) but it’s a phenomenal amount to pay and we get bigger gates than the club which is prepared to pay it.

“We are not at that stage where we can compete with that. We have got to be diligent and cut our cloth accordingly.

“We have to try to find the right ones who we think are going to do us the right job. But we can’t get into that market at the moment because we will probably end up where the club was a few years ago. We don’t want to do that, but we will get there in the end,” added Jones, who believes the transfer window in January simply serves to inflate the market.

“I just don’t agree with the transfer window. It’s not right, it can’t be right.”

Saturday was the final match of the loan deals for Premier League duo Jeremy Helan and Mamady Sidibe.

The impact of Manchester City’s Helan, in particular, has been significant and the Owls are in talks to extend both players’ time at Hillsborough. Stoke City’s Sidibe was an unused substitute against Wolves.

“We are still in negotiations with the clubs, we will speak to them and see,” said Jones.

While Wednesday’s need for a striker was obvious to anyone at Hillsborough on Saturday, Jones said he took plenty of positives from his side’s performance.

Wingers Michail Antonio and Jermaine Johnson played up front and both missed several good chances against Wolves.

“We have just taken a point from a side that has just come out of the Premier League,” said Jones. “They have probably got a wage bill three times our size, and yet we have probably been the better team. The only negative is that we didn’t finish them off. We have done everything but score. We just needed that finishing touch.

“I can’t fault them in any way because we worked really hard. I thought there was only one team trying to get it down and play, to be honest.

“It’s just unfortunate that we didn’t finish the game off.”

It proved to be a satisfactory return to South Yorkshire for Dean Saunders, two weeks after quitting Doncaster Rovers to take the Wolves job.

“It’s a great point away from home,” said Saunders. “It was difficult to play against them. They just bombarded long balls. They missed a few half-chances. But we coped well and showed spirit and determination.”