Sheffield Wednesday 0 Brentford 0: High-flying Owls draw blank on frustrating day at Hillsborough

A well-drilled Brentford side may have dented the Owls’ 100 per cent home record after seven successive League One wins, but 22 points out of a possible 24 is championship-winning form.

Yet Megson was aggrieved that the Owls surrendered their proud Hillsborough record, after being stifled by the visitors’ defensive performance and time-wasting tactics.

“We have had double the amount of chances they had, double the amount of corners, and at 0-0 we are a little bit down because we haven’t kept our record of winning every game and they’re celebrating and shouting out ‘you couldn’t break us down’,” said Megson.

“At the end of the game we turned round to shake hands and they’re celebrating, jumping up and down, because they have got a 0-0 here. It’s a lesson learned and we have got to get better at coping with that type of thing.

“It’s obviously a much better point for Brentford than it is us, because of the way they played, but good luck to them. We have got to accept that will happen at Hillsborough and it’s viewed as a terrific result for them.

“I thought they made a decent start, to be frank, but I wasn’t on the edge of my seat thinking we were being outplayed. We were just huffing and puffing and couldn’t score.

“There were loads of chances, we just needed to score and they would have had to change the way they played. Because we couldn’t score the game became a little bit of a stalemate at times. What stopped us scoring was wayward finishing at times and a blanket of nine players to get through.”

This game never felt like your typical 0-0 stalemate. The lively Sam Saunders picked out Bees team-mate Gary Alexander, but he failed to keep his header on target.

At the other end, Wednesday midfielder James O’Connor’s acrobatic volley forced Brentford goalkeeper Richard Lee into a stunning save.

Next to miss out was captain Rob Jones. The centre-half was lurking unmarked at the far post, and when Ben Marshall – so often the attacking force behind the hosts’ intent – floated the ball over, it looked a certain goal but the usually reliable Jones fluffed his header and the chance was gone.

Wednesday should have been made to pay for their wasted chances, but first Miguel Llera headed against the crossbar, before Clayton Donaldson failed to keep his header on target.

The second-half was one-way traffic towards the Kop as Wednesday built up a head of steam, Chris O’Grady and Marshall both having chances.

Yet if there was one moment when the home supporters maybe knew it wasn’t going to be their day, it came midway through the half.

Full-back Lewis Buxton delivered a sumptuous low drive across the six-yard box which was crying out to be converted. But three Wednesday players failed to react, Ryan Lowe the closest to making a connection.

“They were queuing up to miss” was how one Owls fan sitting next to the press box described it, and you could feel the frustration creeping in. And when Jones’s close-range header from another Marshall corner was somehow hacked off the line by the Bees defence, that was their best chance gone.

The Owls switched formations in the second half to try and break down Brentford, going 4-3-3 and then reverting to 4-4-2 with flying winger Jermaine Johnson shoved into central midfield after the impressive Jose Semedo had to go off with concussion.

“We ended up switching to all sorts of formations, with JJ in the middle of the park with Ben Marshall and Liam Palmer, but I thought at the end of the day we just ended up with too many square pegs in round holes,” explained Megson.

“We are a little bit disappointed in terms of standards what we have come to expect and what we want.

“We are disappointed to have drawn at home, yet we have taken 22 points out of 24.

“Things have changed here, last season we would have lost that game without a shadow of a doubt and we have to accept that teams will change how they play when they come here.

“I think it’s the first time in a long time that we haven’t scored but I thought Chris O’Grady played well. With Ryan Lowe, it’s difficult when you’re not a big lad because they put a lot of men behind the ball and there wasn’t much space in there.

“There will be times when people don’t score but when that happens, you have also then got to make sure that you don’t get beat.”

Sheffield Wednesday: Bywater, Buxton, Jones, Batth, Reynolds, Marshall, Lines (Palmer 46), Semedo (Morrison 67), O’Connor (J Johnson 50), O’Grady, Lowe. Unused substitutes: O’Donnell, Bennett

Brentford: Lee, O’Connor, Woodman, Eger, Saunders (Weston 73), Douglas, Donaldson, McGinn (Logan 86), Diagouraga, Llera, Alexander (Bean 79). Unused substitutes: Devlin, Grella.