Sheffield Wednesday’s effort and commitment can not be faulted - Tony Pulis

The Owls have been a 3-5-2 team under Garry Monk this season but his successor reverted to 4-5-1.

In the opening stages at a Preston North End team who had not picked up a point at home all season, Wednesday were very cautious, leaving centre-forward Windass isolated, but the plan was to make use of Callum Paterson’s goal threat from midfield as the match went on.

With Paterson needed to play at centre-forward after Windass was sent off for a high boot, that never happened, and the Owls were beaten 1-0.

“The first 15 minutes away from home you want to be nice and bright, keep it tight,” explained Pulis.

“I think if you’ve got Massimo (Luongo, fit after a six-match absence) who’s quite happy to hold there and Barry (Bannan) with great quality, Paterson can score a goal from midfield. We were hoping once the game settled down we’d release Patto to get in the box and try to get as many crosses in from Mo (Odubajo) and Reachy (Adam Reach), and Paterson arriving late is as dangerous as anybody in the Championship.

“There were good signs at times but when you go down to 10 men it’s really difficult, you change the system completely.

“We’d worked all week on certain things and it just goes out of the window but you can’t fault their effort or their commitment, it was absolutely fabulous.”

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