During the 2013–14 football season, Sheffield Wednesday Football Club competed in three professional football competitions. Sheffield Wednesday competed in the 2013–14 Football League Championship, 2013–14 FA Cup, and the 2013–14 Football League Cup. It was the Owls' second consecutive season in the Football League Championship having secured promotion from League One in the 2011–12 season and then securing Championship safety on the last day of the 2012–13 season. The Football League season kicked off in the beginning of August, along with the League Cup in the same month. Meanwhile, with Sheffield Wednesday being within the top two-tiers of the English football league system the club did not enter the FA Cup until the beginning of January 2014 where they entered Round 3 of the competition.
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Pre-season Following the end of the 2012–13 football league season, Jérémy Hélan, Danny Pugh, Seyi Olofinjana, Leroy Lita and Steve Howard all returned to their parent clubs following their loans at Sheffield Wednesday. Many players were out of contract in the summer of 2013 and therefore many decisions had to be made on players' futures at the club within May and June. The first transfer of the new pre-season was confirmed just a few days after the end of the 2012–13 football season as development squad player Bastien Héry signed for Rochdale. Sheffield Wednesday youth players Ayo Obileye, Emmanuel Dieseruvwe and Johnny Fenwick soon all signed their first professional contracts with the club, all lasting one-year. On 16 May 2013, the club announced their retained list, with Player of the Year Lewis Buxton, Stephen Bywater, Giles Coke, Jermaine Johnson, Miguel Llera and David Prutton being the senior players to re-sign, while Adam Hinchliffe and Hayden White (who was rumoured to be signing for Bolton Wanderers) were offered their first professional contract. Nicky Weaver and Julian Bennett were released along with youth players Matthew Fletcher and Harry Grant. Also, out-of-favour midfielder Nejc Pečnik left by mutual consent. On 19 June 2013, the first transfer in relation to Sheffield Wednesday was revealed, with Chris O'Grady joining Yorkshire rivals Barnsley for an undisclosed fee, rumoured to be around £300,000. The week after the O'Grady departure, two players had decided whether their futures still lay with Sheffield Wednesday. Promising youth player Hayden White rejected an offer to sign with the team and went with Bolton Wanderers. White had been heavily followed the previous season with his impressive performances for the Owls' youth team and was linked with a possible move to Manchester United at one point. Elsewhere, senior player Stephen Bywater had also rejected signing and went with Millwall on a free transfer for a two-year contract. Bywater played a major part in the side's promotion in the 2011–12 season where he was signed permanently in January of that season. A day after these departures it was confirmed that David Prutton had signed to stay for the next season. Prutton is the second senior player to re-sign after Lewis Buxton signed later that month. 24-hours after Prutton's contract confirmation, Sheffield Wednesday's first signing of the season was confirmed. The signing was Jacques Maghoma from Burton Albion. He has signed a two-year contract after scoring 18 goals in League Two last season from the wing. Another player committed his future at Sheffield Wednesday on 27 June when Miguel Llera signed a new one-year contract at the club, having been a key player in defence over the last two-seasons. Another senior player yet to confirm where his future lay was Giles Coke, but he also chose to commit his future to Wednesday by signing a two-year contract at the club a day after Llera had signed his. Into July and nearly a week after Coke signed with the team, Jermaine Johnson was the last remaining senior player to be offered a contract that he signed to stay for the following season. He is one of the longest playing team players having made over 200 appearances having since joined the club in 2007 Later that day, it was confirmed that the club's midfielder Chris Lines had left by mutual consent. Lines was signed in the summer of 2011 and in the 2011–12 season he made the majority of his 53 appearances and scored all of his 4 goals.
Sheffield Wednesday's first pre-season fixtures were announced on 15 May; the club confirmed that the first pre-season game would be away to Scunthorpe United on 13 July and then the side would, like the previous season, play two pre-season fixtures in Portugal, this time against Hull City in the second game in Portugal on 20 July, while the first game in the country was later confirmed to be Sporting Braga on 16 June 2013. A day later Chesterfield were confirmed to be friendly opponents on 27 July at their ground. Scottish giants Rangers was confirmed at the end of May to be the only pre-season friendly that will be at home, with the game due to take place mid-week on 24 July. The Owls played in their first pre-season friendly on 6 July 2013 with a "behind-closed-doors" friendly. The game was hosted at St George's Park National Football Centre, where the team played Romanian first-tier champions Steaua București. It ended in a 1–1 draw with goals either side of the half with Miguel Llera scoring for Wednesday in the second-half. Tuesday, 9 July saw Sheffield Wednesday play in a friendly-testimonial game against Stockport County. The game was a testimonial for Rodger Wylde, whose first club was Sheffield Wednesday and his last Stockport County, between his career spanning 1972–1989. Wednesday took the lead within 43 seconds when Michail Antonio scored for the Owls, Martin Taylor scored after 12-minutes and the game was wrapped up when Chris Maguire scored a penalty at the stroke of half-time. There were no further goals in the game but ex-Wednesday players Chris Waddle and David Hirst made appearances in the last 15 minutes of the game for the Owls. Three days after this game, one of last season's loanees signed on a permanent-basis: Jérémy Hélan signed on a four-year contract, making it the longest current contract at the club. The weekend after Hélan's signing, Sheffield Wednesday faced Scunthorpe United away in a friendly. It was a first-half strike by new signing Hélan that gave the Owls a 1–0 victory in this pre-season friendly. Similarly to last season's pre-season Sheffield Wednesday flew to a training camp in Portugal, where they would play two games in just under a week. The first game was against top Portuguese side Sporting Braga, whom although were trailing by one goal thanks to a Martin Taylor's header after nineteen minutes, scored twice in the last five-minutes of the first half and then also scored in the second to win the game 3–1. Although it was Sheffield Wednesday's first loss of their pre-season it was still seen as a good workout. Wednesday's second and last game in Portugal was against newly promoted Hull City, the game was fairly even and the Owls's best chance fell after great work by Michail Antonio in the middle of the park led to a pass threading through to Jérémy Hélan, who rounded the goalkeeper and had his shot cleared off the line. Meanwhile, Hull's best chance was when they scored, though the goal was disallowed for offside. Another pre-season workout was completed, but this time finished in a goalless draw. Sheffield Wednesday returned from their trip to Portugal in the week commencing 22 July, where they prepared for their final two pre-season friendlies against Rangers and Chesterfield. The Rangers game was the only home friendly of pre-season for the Owls and Rangers brought 6,000 fans to the game, selling out the away stand at Hillsborough Stadium, just for a friendly match. Although the away support was as if the game was a competitive fixture, the match was still played like a friendly. Both sides were fairly evenly matched and when Wednesday got a corner on 12-minutes Michail Antonio's shot bounced off the ground a looped into the goal to give Sheffield Wednesday the lead. And that was the only goal of the game, giving Sheffield Wednesday their third win of pre-season. Under 24-hours after the Rangers game and Sheffield Wednesday signed their third player of the new season, European striker Atdhe Nuhiu. Nuhiu has played in the top-league of Austria for the most of his career and signed on a three-year contract on a free transfer from Rapid Wien. Two-days later and Nuhiu played in Sheffield Wednesday's final pre-season fixture, this being away to Chesterfield. Although the Owls dominated the first half, it was Chesterfield who were leading at half-time thanks to a goal from Hamza Bencherif on 29 minutes. Wednesday deservedly equalised though late in the second-half with just two-minutes of normal time as Chris Maguire scored from 20-yards. Sheffield Wednesday's pre-season was over after seven pre-season friendlies in preparation for the upcoming season, with the first game a week away against Queens Park Rangers.
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