The young Owls stopper has been suffering from a finger injury.
Arsenal’s Olivier Giroud in action with Sheffield Wednesday’s Joe Wildsmith
According to a report in the Sheffield Star, promising young Sheffield Wednesday goalkeeper Joe Wildsmith will be out of action for at least another month.
The 20-year-old’s only appearance for the Owls this season came in the shock 2-1 League Cup defeat at Cambridge in early August, and he has not been available for selection since last month due to a finger injury sustained in training.
“Joe had surgery on his finger and will be out some weeks,” said Wednesday manager Carlos Carvalhal.
“He did it in training and these things take time to recover from.”
Sheffield Wednesday manager Carlos Carvalhal
Wildsmith has been joined on the treatment table by fellow goalkeeper Keiren Westwood, who injured his back in the first half of Wednesday’s draw with Cardiff and missed the weekend’s victory over QPR as a result.
The injury problems in the goalkeeping department have benefited Wildsmith’s fellow academy graduate Cameron Dawson, who replaced Westwood in South Wales and kept his first Owls clean sheet at Hillsborough on Saturday.
Dawson made some fine saves to keep the R’s at bay as Wednesday successfully protected the lead given to them by Gary Hooper.
Sheffield Wednesday’s Gary Hooper
Carvalhal stressed that he feels confident in all three of his frontline stoppers, a fortunate position for the Portuguese boss to find himself in.
“I have complete trust in all of our goalkeepers and sleep very easy no matter which one of them starts,” he said.
There is a chance that Westwood could return for this weekend’s visit to Derby, with the Owls boss keeping his cards close to his chest on the Irish international’s recovery.
Sheffield Wednesday’s Keiren Westwood saves from Brighton’s Jiri Skalak
Wildsmith’s setback has come at a poor time for the youngster, who was ahead of Dawson in the pecking order at the start of the campaign and kept a clean sheet in the 3-0 win over Arsenal last season.
He will now have to battle it out with his fellow young prodigy to be the back-up to Westwood when all three Wednesday goalkeepers are fit to play.
The future certainly looks bright for Sheffield Wednesday on the goalkeeping front, with two promising youngsters backing up the established no.1 – the Hillsborough outfit should be in safe hands for the foreseeable future.
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