Darren Moore admits Wednesday had to dig deep to beat battling Shrewsbury

Posted Sunday, November 20, 2022 by PA

Sheffield Wednesday manager Darren Moore admitted his side had to dig deep to beat Shrewsbury 1-0 at Hillsborough.

A first-half goal from Mark McGuinness, the on-loan defender’s first for the Owls, was enough to give Wednesday the victory over a battling Shrews side who could have snatched an equaliser late on.

With leaders Plymouth being held by Burton, third-placed Wednesday are now just three points behind the League One pacesetters, but Moore knows his side had to work hard to emerge victorious on Saturday.

He said: “It was a tough game today. We knew the low block was coming and we had to find a way around that whilst keeping our back door shut.

“Shrewsbury are a disciplined team, they find a way to stay in games. Steve (Cotterill) is a good manager, he knows his way around this league.

“I have to give credit to set the set-piece coach. It was a textbook corner and I’m happy we have another new goalscorer in Mark, everyone is chipping in.

“All our defenders will get the plaudits today but I’m especially pleased with Mark’s performance and his goal today.

“In the last 10 minutes we were dogged. You can’t win every game by four or five and believe it or not these wins by one goal are just as pleasing. It wasn’t a pretty game and we could’ve done with that second goal.

“A few more teams will come here and play like that so we have lots to learn from that game. All credit to the boys, they dug in and were resolute in their defending. Three more points at S6 and our run continues.”

Shrewsbury boss Cotterill thought his side did more than enough to get a better result from the game.

He said: “I’m really pleased with the performance. We’ve stuck a really good team on the back foot and we’ve definitely played well enough in the second half to get a result.

“We didn’t want it to be like that, we wanted to attack from the off but they started well. I think as the game went on we got fitter and stronger.

“It is disappointing to concede from a set-play, we’ve lost our man and it’s ended up in the back of the net. There are fine margins in this league.

“If we hadn’t conceded that goal we could have got them even more anxious at the end. I don’t know if we’ve done enough to win but we’ve done enough to not get beat.

“There won’t be many teams who put Wednesday on the back foot the way we did. We didn’t step off them and at the end, absolutely, they were hanging on.

“It was nice to see the support at the end, there’s a good rapport between the fans and the players. We just have to keep the good performances going.”