Ear defenders at the ready as Peterborough United face Sheffield Wednesday for the first time since that fateful night

It’s the first meeting of the teams since that astonishing night at Hillsborough in May 2023 when Wednesday overturned a 4-0 first leg deficit to beat Posh on penalties in a League One play-off semi-final.

We can park most memories of that night until the League One trip to South Yorkshire in February, but it’s a given that cries of ‘4-0 up and you messed it up,’ or a more vulgar version of that, will ring out from the away end on Saturday. There will be a lot of away fans present as well as Posh have handed over the GH Display Stand to Wednesday-ites with 4,000 expected to travel.

Sky Sports are covering the game this weekend and it’s a racing certainty Hillsborough, 2023 will get a mention in the first few seconds of the broadcast and then pretty much all the way through it.

What, understandably, gets forgotten is how good Posh were in that first leg at London Road. Even much-maligned goalkeeper Will Norris shone with two fine saves before the Posh attackers went on the rampage. Goals from Jack Taylor, Joe Ward, Kwame Poku and Jonson Clarke-Harris had seemingly put Posh in an unassailable position.

It was one of the great Posh performances under the London Road floodlights, and that won’t change despite what happened in the second leg.

Posh actually have a decent Football League record against Wednesday at London Road. Posh have won five of the 10 meetings and lost only two.

Earlier in that 2022-23 season Posh had beaten Wednesday 2-0 with second-half goals from Taylor and Clarke-Harris. Reece James had been sent off in the first-half, although he would gain plenty of revenge at Hillsborough several months later by scoring a vital goal.

The previous meeting was a crucial one at the back end of the 2011-12 Championship season. Grant McCann settled the last home game of the season with a second-half free kick winner, a goal that gave Posh the upper hand in a season-long relegation battle.

Sadly that was another false dawn in a ‘great escape that never was’ as Posh were beaten 3-2 at Crystal Palace on the final day and went down with a record high 54 points.

It was 5-3 to Posh on another memorable 2011 night soon after one of Darren Ferguson’s returns to the club. Wednesday led 3-2 at the break, but Posh turned it around in spectacular style. The home goals were scored by Craig Mackail-Smith (2), George Boyd (2) and Nat Mendez-Laing.

Posh have won the last three meetings and Wednesday haven’t been successful since 2003 when a Shefki Kuqi goal won a League Two game. Posh full-back Chris Kanu was sent off later in the contest.

Wednesday’s other victory at London Road arrived in 1976, 2-1 in a Division Three game. A rare goal from Jack Carmichael, one of just seven he scored in 420 appearances, had given Posh a half-time lead.