Wednesday secured their place in the next round of the Jersey Mike's Trophy with a group game to spare after beating Sunderland Under-21s 2-0 at Hillsborough on Tuesday night.
Goals either side of half-time from Jaden Heskey and substitute Barry Bannan sealed a routine win for the Owls, who can now look forward to their final group game against Accrington Stanley next month with the knowledge that their place in the knockout stages is already sealed.
Manager Henrik Pedersen made six changes to his starting line-up from the 2-1 win over Salford City a fortnight ago, bringing Connal Trueman, Sean Fusire, Ricardo Santos, Gabriel Otegbayo, Billy Mitchell and Callum Slattery into the team in place of Ashley Maynard-Brewer, Ernie Weaver, Di’Shon Bernard, Reece James, Will Grainger and Davis Keillor-Dunn.
Wednesday started on the front foot and brought two saves out of Black Cats goalkeeper Joe Cowan inside the opening six minutes. First, Mason Burstow saw a low drive from inside the penalty area saved before Slattery, who had connected with a brilliant Liam Palmer cross from the left, saw a header tipped over the crossbar.
Wednesday continued to make most of the early running and they eventually broke the deadlock with 21 minutes on the clock. Fusire intercepted a misplaced pass by experienced Sunderland defender Luke O'Nien, played a neat one-two with Jarvis Thornton and sent over a low cross that was turned home by Heskey, who claimed his first senior goal by cooly dinking the ball over Cowan.
Sunderland's youngsters almost responded immediately, though, when a low drive from Felix Scott went just wide of the post after Owls debutant Trueman got fingertips to his effort.
With half-time looming, Wednesday brought another save out of Cowan when Slattery, latching onto an excellent pass by Thornton, decided to shoot from a tight angle, before Sunderland, at the other end, wasted a golden opportunity to equalise when experienced midfielder Alan Browne fired an effort wide from inside the penalty area after being slipped in by Tom Proctor.
Owls chief Pedersen shuffled his pack at half-time, making four changes, bringing on Denny Oliver, Jamal Lowe, James and Bannan.
Lowe, who scored against Salford after coming off the bench in the Owls' last Jersey Mike's Trophy outing, went within a whisker of doubling Wednesday's advantage when he connected with James' cross from the left, but his effort from the edge of the six-yard box was expertly kept out by Cowan.
Chances were at a premium after the break, but Wednesday were left to breathe a sigh of relief when the linesman's flag went up to chalk off what Sunderland thought was an equaliser from Trey Ogunsuyi.
With ten minutes to go, Wednesday sealed the three points and their place in the next round when the ball broke kindly for Bannan inside the penalty area and he fired an unstoppable shot past Cowan to claim his first goal of the campaign.
Wednesday starting XI: Trueman; Fusire, Santos (James 46'), Otegbayo, Palmer; Mitchell (Bannan 46'), Thornton (Duruh 78'); Slattery (Oliver 46'), Heskey, Akpobi; Burstow (J. Lowe 46').
Substitutes: Maynard-Brewer, Hatfield.
Sunderland U21s starting XI: Cowan; Lienard (Neild 76'), Bell, O'Nien, Jones; Whittaker (Munyakazi 85'), Browne; Scott (Barker 82'), Proctor, Dinsdale; Ogunsuyi (Neill 78').
Substitutes: Metcalf, Hindon, Hunt.