Sheffield Wednesday 1 Reading 0: Owls confident of causing Cup shock against the might of City

In the week when his country folk said ‘No’ to Scottish independence, May answered in the affirmative ahead of Wednesday night’s Capital One Cup trip to the Etihad Stadium.

Speaking after his 83rd-minute winner which accounted for Reading at Hillsborough – victory took the Owls into the Championship play-off places – May believes a cup upset is on the cards.

That confidence comes from seven clean sheets in 10 games – including the scalp of another Premier League side in Burnley at Turf Moor in the previous round.

First-choice strike pairing Atdhe Nuhiu and May, whose goal on Saturday was his third of the season since arriving last month from Scotland, were dropped to the bench for the Burnley tie but hope to start at City.

“We’ve known about it a long time but now we can finally look at it,” said Gray.

“We are not going there thinking we’ve been beaten already. We’ve got a chance if we work hard and everybody sticks to their jobs.

“Everyone is going to be desperate to play so it’s one to look forward to.

“We know it will be tough but there is no reason why we can’t cause an upset. We’ve seen cup shocks in the past and, hopefully, there will be another one on Wednesday night.”

In the entire Football League, only Wolverhampton Wanderers have a better defensive record than Wednesday this season.

The Owls needed their new-found defensive resolve on Saturday as Reading had several glorious chances to score.

Goalkeeper Keiren Westwood, the former Sunderland No 1, was the man of the match with some stunning saves.

After Giles Coke conceded a first-half penalty, with a clumsy foul on Glenn Murray, the latter drilled his spot-kick down the centre of goal but a diving Westwood managed to block with his trailing leg before grasping the rebound.

Westwood then got his body in the way of Jake Cooper’s close-range header, after the break, before tipping away Nick Blackman’s long-range effort.

Match-winner May was quick to praise his side’s defence, and Westwood – who is keeping former England goalkeeper Chris Kirkland on the sidelines – in particular. “We’ve got a great foundation with the back four and the goalkeeper,” he said. “We look solid. You can see it every week that we don’t look like conceding goals.

“When they get past the back four, Westy seems to save it. That’s the foundation you need if you are going to have a successful season and, thankfully, we’ve got that there. That’s half the battle and it gives us that attacking freedom. We know we’ve got a base who are going to keep clean sheets.”

On Westwood, May added: “He’s as good a goalkeeper as I’ve come across.

“We see it in training every day the saves that he pulls off. You can tell he’s played at the highest level. He had a great game today. That’s a bonus and, hopefully, we can see a few more games from him like that in the weeks to come.”

May’s goal came from a free-kick with seven minutes left, which rewarded a brighter second-half performance. But it took a wicked deflection to wrong-foot goalkeeper Mikkel Andersen.

Left-back Joe Mattock had come closest to breaking the deadlock but his shot from a well-worked corner was blocked on the line.

May has international aspirations – “I’d heard Gordon Strachan was here. I think he was watching Chris Maguire!” – but he is not setting any personal targets.

“It was nice to get a first home goal and win of the season. As a team, I think we are working really hard and playing some nice football. Maybe not as nice today as we have done in other games but we got the job done and that’s definitely the main aim.

“I’m just taking it one game at a time. I’m not setting any targets. The most important thing is we keep picking up points.

“It was a hard-fought match. Reading came here and put in a good performance. They worked hard and pressed us high up the park. They made it difficult for us.

“But we came out in the second half and we knew we would have a 15- to 20-minute spell when we would be on top and it was a case of making the most of it. We got a bit of fortune with the goal.”

This was arguably the worst Wednesday have played all campaign, in front of a season-best crowd of 29,848, but they scrapped their way to victory, and they were denied a penalty late on when Alex Pearce’s handball, as May pushed for a second, went unpunished.

Sheffield Wednesday: Westwood, Palmer, Lees, Loovens, Mattock, Maguire (Helan 75), Coke (Hope 65), Semedo, Maghoma (Dielna 90), May, Nuhiu. Unused substitutes: Kirkland, Buxton, Zayatte, Madine.

Reading: Andersen, Gunter, Pearce, Cooper, Taylor, Obita, Norwood, Akpan (Guthire 88), Blackman, Murray (Pogrebnyak 67), Cox (Mackie 74). Unused substitutes: Edwards, Kuhl, Long, Lincoln.