Henrik Pedersen reflected on the difference between our performances in each half as Wednesday’s League One opener at Hillsborough last night ended in a disappointing 1-0 defeat to Bradford City in front of more than 33,000 fans.

We dominated the first half, the visitors found it difficult to cope with our slick passing movements and opportunities were create. However, we failed to turn those plusses into goals and Bradford keeper Jon McCracken wasn’t brought into as much action as our build-up play deserved.

Barry Bannan fired just wide early on before bringing a good save out of McCracken, although the Wednesday man will probably feel he might have done better.

Louie Barry sent a curler inches off-target but there was a warning for the Owls just before the break. Bradford opened us up down the right but Kayden Jackson’s low cross went across the Kop penalty box and away to safety.

However, City went ahead two minutes into the second half when we failed to clear from a corner and Aden Baldwin shot home from close range.

Rocked by that unexpected goal, Wednesday struggled to reproduce anything like our first-half display and the visitors looked more likely to double their lead with Joe Lumley saving from Jake Beesley and Adam Phillips.

Even a triple substitution 20 minutes from time  – including Liverpool loanee Kieran Morrison signed earlier in the day – failed to do the trick.

And our one real chance of the second half came in added time but Jamal Lowe turned the ball wide from close-in.

Boss Pedersen said afterwards: “It was a strong, strong first half from us where we created a lot of chances. But when you create so many chances you also have to take them.

“In the second half, they score from the second phase after a set-piece, a second goal we have conceded in a row from a set-piece situation.

“The confidence, trust and belief we had in the first half then dropped down a bit and overall the second-half was not good enough,

“The season is long but we have to learn quickly that from 1-0 down we cannot lose the confidence and belief. It’s a challenge in such a situation as to how we attack it, we need to then show more intensity, play with bigger hearts, be more forward in our play and press with more intensity.”

Lumley, Valery, Otegbayo (Santos 81), Cooper (Swinkels 69), M Lowe, Mitchell (Burstow 69), Bannan, Slattery, Gray, Barry (Morrison 69), J Lowe. Unused subs: Trueman, Palmer, Thornton.

Attendance: 33,188.