A 0-0 draw at Hillsborough may not have provided great entertainment for the 20,000-plus fans last night but a clean sheet and a battling performance will give The Owls confidence.
He told Footymad: "We played better against Plymouth than we have done in previous games. They came here and didn’t really try to play, just sit back and I think they were happy with the draw. We weren’t great ourselves but we created some good chances and that’s a vast improvement on some recent performances.
As for Wednesday usually giving their opponents a 45-minute head start, the Ireland Under-21 skipper does not know what has happened in the previous three games against Derby, Cardiff and Watford but is confident it will not become a habit.
"I can’t tell you that myself!" Whelan admits. "I can’t put my finger on it but we always seem to come out in the second half a lot better – sometimes it seems as if we need a bit of a rollicking to get us going but tonight we proved we can improve although we still need to play better and grind out wins."