The penultimate match in the opening round of the Sky Bet Championship season takes place on Sunday afternoon with Hillsborough the destination for the match between Sheffield Wednesday and Plymouth Argyle.
Sheffield Wednesday are expected to be huge improvers this season while Plymouth have been written off having appointed Wayne Rooney as manager and it will be interesting to see if that is how this one plays out or if there is a surprise in store.
Where to watch
The match will be shown live and in full on the Sky Sports Main Event and Sky Sports Football channels with the build-up beginning at 3.15pm ahead of the 4pm kick off.
Sheffield Wednesday
The Owls spent much of last season in the bottom three but full credit goes to Danny Rohl for getting them into their best form when it really mattered which enabled them to come out of the bottom three and retain their Championship status. He probably enhanced his reputation among neutrals during the Euros when he talked an impressive game while he was on the ITV coverage and you can certainly see why many think they are the big improvers in waiting in this division.
Rohl has made some astute signings in the close season, many of whom have the experience of going very well in the Championship and if they bed in from the outset then Sheffield Wednesday will be confident of getting off to a positive start this term at the very least. If you read anything into pre-season their results have been mixed but it is always dangerous to look too much into that because they are largely an exercise in finding sharpness.
Plymouth Argyle
There will be a lot of eyes on Plymouth Argyle this season after they appointed Wayne Rooney who stunk the place out with Birmingham City last term. The expectation is that a team who struggled for the majority of last season, who doesn’t have the biggest budget and who have employed a manager with the perception of being out of his depth at this level is a recipe for disaster so there is plenty to prove for all those associated with the Devon outfit.
I don’t necessarily buy Plymouth struggling because they have appointed Wayne Rooney. I accept his Birmingham tenure was terrible but there were a lot of mitigating circumstances to that and with a full pre-season under the England legend, if Plymouth look terrible then the doubts over the former Derby manager will be fair enough. One issue they might have is they haven’t really strengthened massively in the summer so Rooney will have needed to bring improvement out of those already in the ranks.
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Team News
Danny Rohl is expected to have a fully fit squad to choose from for this match with the exception of goalkeeper Ben Hamer who is out with a hand injury. Jamal Lowe, Max Lowe, Nathaniel Chalobah and Olaf Kobacki could make their Owls debuts.
Wayne Rooney is said to have been monitoring the fitness of captain Joe Edwards and Darko Gyabi ahead of this opening match. Nathaniel Ogbeta and Ibrahim Cissoko could be in line for their debuts for the Pilgrims.
Betting
Sheffield Wednesday appear to be all the rage in this match and I certainly like them over the course of the season but I sense much of the favour of the Owls is down to the perception of Wayne Rooney as a manager and I would want to see Plymouth Argyle in action before I write him and them off completely. I wouldn’t be surprised if Wednesday win this anyway because Plymouth are always disadvantaged on the road from a geographical point of view but this early in the season odds on shots don’t interest me unless there are genuine reasons to oppose the outsiders.
I happen to think the better bet in this match is for over 2.5 goals. While we don’t know how strong Plymouth will be under Wayne Rooney, the one thing we do know is that they are going to play out from the back and look to attack because that is what all of his teams have done and he isn’t going to change his philosophy. Wednesday aren’t short of attacking talent and they might press higher this season with Rohl having had a full pre-season with a squad which he has moulded in the transfer window. We’ve seen a fairly high scoring weekend in the Championship and I think three more goals can come here.
Tips
Back Over 2.5 goals for a 3/10 stake at 1.95 with Unibet
