'Kamikaze' Owls stuffed on opening day

The new season started in disastrous fashion for Wednesday as they were thumped 4-1 at Ipswich. Manager Brian Laws described his sides performance as 'kamikaze' as he watched his side concede three goals inside the first 25 minutes of play.

Laws handed debuts to goalkeeper Lee Grant and striker Francis Jeffers but it was to be a particularly hard day at the office for Grant and his defence.

The Owls were a goal down after two minutes when Lee Bullen fouled Pablo Counago in the box and Alan Lee sent Grant the wrong way from the spot. Lee set up Gary Roberts to volley home a second less than ten minutes later and the goal fest continued after 25 minutes when the danger man Lee fired in a third.

Laws changed his defence around at the break with Steve Watson dropping to centre back in place of Bullen, while Kenny Lunt came on to play in central midfield alongside Glenn Whelan.

Things were to get worse for Wednesday before they got better. Counago tucked home a fourth from a Jonathan Walters cross without a Wednesday defender in sight.

The Owls grabbed a scrappy late consolation through substitute Leon Clarke. Marcus Tudgay's shot was blocked before Clarke's semi mis-hit effort squeezed it's way past a defender on the line.

Wednesday's opening day result comes on the back of three defeats on the trot in pre-season, two of those against lower league opposition. It's early days but these are worrying signs for Wednesday.

Laws verdict: "We gifted the goals to Ipswich and it was almost kamikaze stuff. There were costly individual mistakes which were just not good enough." "The only positive to come from the game was that we drew the second half." "I have a lot of work on my hands, I wasn't expecting so many bad performances, we almost capitulated."