Sheffield Wednesday fans wondered who their new manager was in June but the former Sporting Lisbon coach is planning a Capital One Cup surprise for Arsenal

It has been a while since Sheffield Wednesday fans were given cause for optimism. The raised eyebrows that greeted the arrival of the largely unheard of Carlos Carvalhal in June as the head coach have lowered and, buoyed by an eight-game unbeaten run, there is a sense something is building at Hillsborough after a period of mediocrity.

Arsenal arrive on Tuesday night in the Capital One Cup looking to inflict a first defeat on Wednesday since early September but, no matter what the result, Carvalhal appears to be on to something good.

The owner, Dejphon Chansiri, who bought the club from Milan Mandaric in January, wants the club to be in the Premier League by 2017 and sought someone capable of taking the team in a different direction. Chansiri sacked Stuart Gray, a dependable manager who kept Wednesday out of danger with an inferior squad compared with the current crop, and immediately said he wanted a high-profile appointment. Sam Allardyce, Paul Lambert and Slavisa Jokanovic were linked to various degrees but when Carvalhal became their first non-British head coach, following an endorsement from his compatriot José Mourinho, it prompted a combination of curiosity and worry among supporters.

Carvalhal’s refreshing approach has, however, captured the imagination. Not too many managers engage daily with fans on Twitter. Even fewer have their CV published online, a move more common with an out-of-work player looking for a club than a coach in employment, and it is difficult to find another who has a contact me page reading: “Every email is read and I’ll try to answer everyone.”

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Such openness is endearing but most importantly he has a new-look squad playing good football and getting results. It may all seem a little idealistic, a relationship still in the honeymoon period, and the praise he is being showered with could change rapidly to more commonly expressed feelings of frustration and anger, but it is a rollercoaster the Wednesday captain, Glenn Loovens, is glad to be riding.

The 32-year-old could justifiably feel irked to find himself in and out of the team such are the options available since Carvalhal brought in 15 players, backed by Chansiri, who made his fortune selling tinned tuna from Thailand. Yet Loovens recognises there is a new buzz around Hillsborough. “This is the strongest squad I’ve been in since coming to the club,” the twice-capped Holland international says.

“To rotate you need a squad where the players are equal and the manager has faith in all of us. He has a confidence in the whole squad. We have a group that it doesn’t matter who he puts in because we’ll do the same job.”

And how Carvalhal likes to rotate. In the previous round, winning 1-0 at Newcastle, he made 10 changes. For last Friday’s victory at Rotherham, the manager had 30 fit first-team players to choose from. Twelve players have scored and only Tom Lees has featured in every Championship game. Their start to the season was inauspicious, winning only one of seven league games but Loovens admits it has taken time to settle.

“We just needed a while to form a team and to get to know each others’ strengths. We had a lot of new players coming in and it always takes time. We’ve got to know each other now and we have had some good results.”

No wonder the defender says “there is something growing here”. It helps that Carvalhal wants his team playing attacking football. “He brought in the players that would help with his philosophy – there is some quality here now,” Loovens says. Carvalhal’s career path is one of the more curious in the Football League. He has managed 15 clubs in 17 years and spent the past three seasons as an adviser for Al Ahli in the United Arab Emirates. He has published two coaching manuals, holds a degree in sports science and is still not 50. Although brief spells at Besiktas and Sporting Lisbon jump out from his résumé, his greatest achievement came at Leixões in 2002 – and it bodes well for Tuesday night’s game. Carvalhal helped the Portuguese third division club to the final of the Taça de Portugal, where they were beaten 1-0 by Sporting but ended up in the following season’s Uefa Cup. He has also guided Vitória Setúbal to a Portuguese League Cup and, most crucially for Chansiri, got them promoted in 2006.

With Arsène Wenger likely to rest a couple of leading players, is there a chance of another upset? Loovens wants the team to treat the game as a free hit with no expectation of a result, but confidence is high. “It’s not just another game because they’re such a big club. We’re all looking forward to it but it’s the type of occasion where all you can do is give your all.

“Of course they are big favourites, a team with a lot of trophies, but we need to make sure we enjoy the moment.”