Sheffield Wednesday's need for a new defender is quite apparent after seeing recent line-ups from Darren Moore - but that man won't be Adrian Mariappa.

As per the news that emerged over the weekend, the Owls offered a contract to the experienced 35-year-old defender due to their mounting injury crisis which has seen the likes of Sam Hutchinson, Lewis Gibson and Dominic Iorfa on the sidelines.

Young Ciaran Brennan was thrown in against Accrington Stanley and played a part in a 3-2 victory at the Wham Stadium but Moore clearly feels the need to add some more steel to the back-line.

 

 

 

 

A deadline of 5pm on Monday was supposedly set for Mariappa to make his decision, but the man who played 25 Championship matches for Bristol City last season has reportedly opted to turn the Owls down.

Per the BBC's Rob Staton, the Jamaica international will instead move to Australia to sign a contract with a club down under, which has been met with a lot of understanding by Wednesday fans as who wouldn't want to spend the summer in a hot country?

The club and Moore must now move on though and surely other defenders will be looked at by the Owls - and there's one out there still waiting to be snapped up in Andre Wisdom who could really do a job at Wednesday.

Due to Derby County's financial struggles over the summer, Wisdom didn't pen a new deal with the Rams although he did appear in some of their pre-season friendlies and trained with the club over the summer.

Months have now passed though and the ex-Liverpool man is still without a club, and he's too solid of a defender to be sitting on the sidelines jobless.

A man with Premier League experience for the Reds and also West Brom and Norwich, Wisdom became a regular under Wayne Rooney last season, playing 38 times in the 2020-21 campaign as County survived the drop to League One by the skin of their teeth.

Wisdom could probably play at Championship level and perhaps he's waiting for a club in the second tier to come in for him, but if you don't ask you don't get and he may not pass up the opportunity at this point to play for a sleeping giant of League One who have aspirations to be higher.

He would almost certainly get regular game-time as well due to the injury situation at Hillsborough and Wisdom seems like the perfect candidate to be picked up by Moore at this point