Laws Pleased For Purse

Wednesday boss Brian Laws couldn’t hide his delight at the way his men performed to pick up three points against Coventry City, and was full of praise for captain Darren Purse.

Purse may well have felt the weight of the world on his shoulders going into the game following criticism for his recent performances in the blue and white stripes.

But, after being given the green light to continue in the heart of the Owls defence by Laws, he popped up to give Wednesday a third minute lead with a bullet header and defended well throughout to help keep a clean sheet and three vital points for Wednesday.

And Laws was delighted to see his summer signing go some way to showing what his qualities are at this level.

‘I was really delighted for the players, particularly the captain, Darren Purse, who has come in for a lot of criticism,’ Laws told the official SWFC website.

‘He’s had a lot to bear on his shoulders over the past two weeks and you can’t ask for much from him than to get the first goal – he was outstanding and didn’t put a foot wrong.

‘Darren has answered a few critics in that respect and he will want to put in a few more performances like that. The main thing though, was that he responded and justified being in the team.’

Purse was just one of the star performers as Wednesday reacted brilliantly from their 3-0 drubbing at Derby last time out, deserving the three points against a battling Sky Blues side.

And although the Owls survived a few controversial decisions by the officials along the way, the Owls gaffer was pleased with his side’s performance to bag three much-needed points.

He said: ‘I thought it was a great first half performance, we deserved the two-goal lead and could have had scored more so in terms of a response they ticked all of the boxes. The second half was a workman-like performance to make sure we secured the result.

‘Coventry were always going to try to get a goal and open us up more after the break but I thought we defended well as a team without having to play well in the second half.’