Peterborough United 4 Sheffield Wednesday 0: Owls collapse meets with furious reaction from away fans

Their League One play-off with Peterborough United is only halfway through but already it is over.

As the Owls went over to applaud the away fans at full-time, they saw plenty of empty seats and furious reactions from those who stayed.

It was no less than they deserved after a 4-0 defeat at London Road.

As the manager Darren Moore will carry the can for this gutless collapse but his players cannot escape.

A club of Wednesday's resources should not be in this position, just as a team who finished 19 points ahead of Peterborough should not lose so comprehensively to them in a play-off semi-final.

As Peterborough United's fans gleefully reminded Sheffield Wednesday fans, they had automatic promotion in their hands – unbeaten for half a season, falling just short of 100 points – and they messed it up.

On Friday night they were handed a second chance and they messed that up even more spectacularly.

It is impossible to see Wednesday overturning a 4-0 defeat at Hillsborough on Thursday. Frail minds will struggle to recover by then.

Exactly what the travelling fans made of it was far too course for the delicate eyeballs of the readers of a family newspaper but safe to say, they do not think their team is very good. Considering the resources they are operating on, that is an unacceptable state of affairs.

The visitors played reasonably well up to a point in the first half but whereas both teams let themselves down with errors, only the Owls were punished. They were too mentally weak to come back from that.

The early signs were that it would be Posh who were made to pay for trying to overplay things.

Michael Smith had the first chance just by puncing when they dwelt on the ball in the eighth minute but he allowed Will Norris to make a good stretching save.

Jack Taylor got carried away after a quarter of an hour, trying to play the ball across his backline and picking out Josh Windass, making his first start since mid-March. Frankie Kent brought him down at the expense of a free-kick Windass hit into the defensive wall. He put the rebound wide.

But in the 20th minute, Posh were gifted the opening goal.

Will Vaulks's stretching tackle played the ball to Taylor, who hit an optimistic shot which went through goalkeeper Cameron Dawson.

It gave Wednesday little choice to attack but fortunately they were well set up for it.

Barry Bannan and Callum Paterson were playing in front of Vaulks, with Windass shuttling between them and Smith.

But two many promising moves broke down for a poor touch or pass, like when Marvin Johnson picked Smith out with a pass only for the ball to bounce off him or when Paterson followed a brilliant piece of skill to turn his man with a woeful finish, or Windass releasing Johnson after a brilliant Bannan backheel only for the cross to be massively overhit.

When Paterson caught a volley sweetly, it was Windass who inadvertently blocked it.

Peterborough got lucky with their second, after 36 minutes, but you could argue Johnson deserved to be punished for turning his back on Joe Ward's long-range shot, which came off him, then the crossbar.

When Windass had a shot deflected five minutes later after being picked out by Michael Ihiekwe, it went wide.

If the away fans were hopiong for a game of two halves, they were to be sorely disappointed.

Kwame Poku made it three six minutes after the restart, Ephron Mason-Clark crossing after a counter-attack and the winger arriving unbmarked at the far post to stoop onto the delivery and out it in.

Wednesday briefly threatened to lose their rag, centre-backs Aden Flint and Ihiekwe booked a minute apart and those in the away did, voicing their disgust as the barely-believing Posh fans gloated.

As Peterborough sat back and Wednesday saw more of the ball, a period of pressure followed but goalbound Ihiekwe efforts were twice cleared by defenders and the appeals when Johnson's shot struck Ronnie Edwards had an air of desperation.

They were picked off again in the 83rd minute, sliced open again in midfield as the ball found Taylor. Dawson touched his effort onto a post but the Posh man had the presence of mind to play the ball back in for Johnson Clarke-Harris to apply the killer touch.

Dawson saved from Poku in the last action of the game but there is surely no coming back from 4-0.

Peterborough United: Norris; Ward, Kent, Edwards, Burrows; Kyprianou, Norburn; Poku, Taylor, Mason-Clark (Jones 90); Clarke-Harris. Unused substitutes: Butler, Knight, Thompson, Randall, Blackmore, Tshimanga.

Sheffield Wednesday: Dawson; Iorfa, Flint, Ihiekwe(James 86); Vaulks; Palmer, Paterson (Gregory 59), Bannan, Johnson; Windass; Smith (Adeniran 61). Unused substitutes: Dele-Bashiru, Bakinson, Stockdale, Hunt.

Referee: A Backhouse (Carlisle).