£2.5m star tipped to be Sheffield Wednesday’s “first player out the door” in January | OneFootball

FLW’s Owls fan pundit wants to see Ike Ugbo sold in January

This article is part of Football League World's 'Terrace Talk' series, which provides personal opinions from our FLW Fan Pundits regarding the latest breaking news, teams, players, managers, potential signings and more…

For most clubs, the future of a single centre-forward would hardly register amid a storm as severe as the one that has engulfed Sheffield Wednesday.

Yet even against the backdrop of administration, unpaid wages, protests and a squad reduced almost to its bare bones, the question of Ike Ugbo has lingered stubbornly in the conversation at Hillsborough.

Ugbo’s loan spell in early 2024 felt like the beginning of something. He arrived with energy and a sense of urgency, scoring decisive goals in Wednesday’s frantic scramble for survival under Danny Rohl.

When the club pushed through a £2.5m permanent deal that summer, it carried a sense of hope that the strides made under the young German coach might continue, that Ugbo could be one of the foundations of a more stable future.

Instead, the ground has shifted underneath everyone. The departures, the missed wages, the points deduction, the resignation to a season of damage limitation - all of it has reframed how supporters view the players who remain.

Pedersen has, to his credit, spoken warmly about Ugbo’s willingness to work without the ball, his defensive application, his ability to operate in the half-spaces that shape Wednesday’s transitions.

But in an Owls side that has been starved of goals and stands marooned at the foot of the table, the absence of cutting edge from a striker signed to provide it has become difficult to overlook.

Fresh scrutiny on Ike Ugbo’s future with Sheffield Wednesday ahead of January window

As January approaches, the question rises to the surface: is it time for Wednesday to move on?

Football League World put that question to resident Owls expert Patrick McKenna, asking whether Ugbo should be offloaded this winter - and, in the current market, what fee Wednesday could realistically hope to recover.

“Yeah, if circumstances allow it in January time, I would certainly have Ike Ugbo as the first player out the door,” McKenna told FLW.

“Quite frankly, his time at Sheffield Wednesday since he's signed permanently has been nothing but woeful, even with all that has gone on.

“Last season when players were getting paid, he still wasn't scoring - and one thing everyone has seen with our team this season is that players are really putting in the effort, but Ugbo does seem to be the anomaly in this.

“He is simply not trying in games, he is just a complete passenger and in a weak and depleted squad, we cannot afford this passenger.

“There's no way to cherry coat the stats, the fact that a striker hasn't scored or even assisted in 48 league appearances, it's absolutely criminal.

“At this stage, I don't think it's going to be a case that he is going to somehow turn it round. He is the epitome of a lost cause, so I think we'll have to accept the reality that we will get nowhere near what we paid for him.

“I think at the very most, maybe a club would take him off us for half a million pound - but I don't really see how you could justify selling a player for any more than that.

“It would be a big hit, but certainly if we can, we just need to get rid of him and move on under a new ownership and with the possibility of bringing in a striker who will actually be able to put the ball in the net every so often.”

Why Sheffield Wednesday may now be better placed to risk an Ike Ugbo sale in January

Judging whether Wednesday could, or should, part ways with Ugbo requires a degree of cold assessment that has often felt at odds with the emotional turbulence surrounding the club.

Yet McKenna’s answer points towards a sentiment increasingly shared among supporters: that a clean break may be the only logical outcome. Not out of malice nor scapegoating, but out of necessity.

In a squad stripped to its structural minimum, the forward line is one of the few areas where Wednesday can point to options rather than absences.

George Brown and Bailey Cadamarteri’s emergence has offered raw promise, Jamal Lowe brings experience, Charlie McNeill shows promise in flashes, and the supporting roles behind the striker give Pedersen more scope for variation than he has elsewhere on the pitch.

Contrast that with central midfield, where departures have left Pedersen with near-zero selection choices, or defence, where teenagers have been asked to carry the burden of Championship survival. Up front, by comparison, there is at least the outline of depth.

That is why moving Ugbo on - however modest the fee, however symbolic the hit - begins to feel less like resignation.

Clearing his wages would ease pressure in the short term, freeing a squad place may allow the Owls' administrators to sanction a targeted addition, and for Ugbo himself, a new setting might be the only way to rediscover the sharpness that flickered during that late season rescue mission.

Wednesday cannot solve their problems in one window, nor undo the structural mismanagement that has led them here.