Barry Bannan lauded as he leads Sheffield Wednesday to first win of the season

Sheffield Wednesday manager Henrik Pedersen hailed captain fantastic Barry Bannan as the Owls beat Portsmouth 2-0 to claim a surprise first league win of the season.

Bannan set Wednesday on their way to victory with a 20-yard free-kick before teenager George Brown sealed the points with his first senior goal on his first league start.

Pedersen said: “I have said that before that it is one thing is to be a good football player, the other thing is to be a good leader and a football player.

“Barry was both today. His free-kick was fantastic but you saw by how he was sprinting around that he also worked for the team.

“He was a good mirror for the other players. When it was difficult, they could look at Barry and get a mirror back to say that he believed and I can do the same. He was fantastic.

“I think that our best player today was the team.

“There were so many good performances but they were built around the team and that was the best way.”

Wednesday, who had taken just a single point from their first five games, opened the scoring in the 12th minute courtesy of Bannan’s second goal of the campaign.

Yan Valery was brought down by Andre Dozzell on the edge of the penalty area and Bannan curled the resulting free-kick beyond Ben Killip to make it 1-0.

Youngster Brown doubled the Owls’ lead five minutes into the second half.

Brown took advantage of Pompey defender Conor Shaughnessy pulling up injured to run unchallenged into the penalty area and firing high into the far corner.

Portsmouth boss John Mousinho said the result was a reality check for his players after the high of last weekend’s 0-0 south coast derby draw at Southampton.

A clearly angry Mousinho said: “Frustration is not the overwhelming emotion because that would signal that we deserved something from the game.

“All week we were talking about how difficult the game would be and talking about how we needed to be right on top of ourselves to stop that complacency creeping in because it has happened previously.

“We made awful decisions right from the start and gave away a free-kick here to invite the pressure.

“We made changes in the second half but we couldn’t find a way back into the game and the damage was done.

“Whenever you give a side anything to hold on to, it is always going to be a different challenge from that point.

“This is almost a bit of a reality check, a reminder of how tough the Championship is.

“If anybody ever ever thinks any game in the Championship would be easy, and maybe that’s what our players did today, then that’s a huge problem.”