Are the Blades the unluckiest club in the League?

All advertisments are hidden for logged in members, why not log in/register?

coaxingstar71

First 10 yards are in the head
Joined
Apr 19, 2015
Messages
6,612
Reaction score
11,308
Location
Norton, Sheffield
Inspired by Woodwardfan....

"Poll and Dean refereeing key games
Ched
Jags pen, Webber's miss.
Scudamore/ Richards stitch-up
23 penalties
No strikers in starting eleven at Wembley time and again -not all a matter of luck I suppose
Blackwell doing well as caretaker
scoring 5 away and losing on aggregate - no defence this time!"

They say that you make your own luck, but over the years, we blades, seem to have been dealt a crap hand when it comes to luck. Some may argue it isn't luck, but here are some other examples I can think of....

The penalties v Walsall 1981
FA Cup Semi 1993
FA Cup Semi 1998
FA Cup Semi 2003
League Cup Semi 2003
Play off finals - all of them? Certainly Huddersfield is the one that stands out.
Relegation 1987 including Hetherston's borderline supernatural ability to hit the woodwork (would have been brill at "crossbar challenge").
Relegation 1994 - Segers, corruption.
Relegation 2007 - Tevez, Jags, Unsworth penalties, Webber miss.
Going a lot further back you might also include...
Missing out on Europe 1975
Missing out on promotion to pigs on goal average 1950

Do all clubs have this luck or do we seem to have more bad luck than others?
The only "good luck" (if you can call it that) I can think of was when we got promoted in 1984 by virtue of scoring more goals than Hull when they could only win 2-0 in their final game.
 

Inspired by Woodwardfan....

"Poll and Dean refereeing key games
Ched
Jags pen, Webber's miss.
Scudamore/ Richards stitch-up
23 penalties
No strikers in starting eleven at Wembley time and again -not all a matter of luck I suppose
Blackwell doing well as caretaker
scoring 5 away and losing on aggregate - no defence this time!"

They say that you make your own luck, but over the years, we blades, seem to have been dealt a crap hand when it comes to luck. Some may argue it isn't luck, but here are some other examples I can think of....

The penalties v Walsall 1981
FA Cup Semi 1993
FA Cup Semi 1998
FA Cup Semi 2003
League Cup Semi 2003
Play off finals - all of them? Certainly Huddersfield is the one that stands out.
Relegation 1987 including Hetherston's borderline supernatural ability to hit the woodwork (would have been brill at "crossbar challenge").
Relegation 1994 - Segers, corruption.
Relegation 2007 - Tevez, Jags, Unsworth penalties, Webber miss.
Going a lot further back you might also include...
Missing out on Europe 1975
Missing out on promotion to pigs on goal average 1950

Do all clubs have this luck or do we seem to have more bad luck than others?
The only "good luck" (if you can call it that) I can think of was when we got promoted in 1984 by virtue of scoring more goals than Hull when they could only win 2-0 in their final game.

For the 765th time, we didn't miss out on Europe in 1975. Even had we won at Birmingham, we would not have qualified.
 
You missed out finishing 5th in 1975 then getting relegated in '76.
 
Worst ever for me..Givens1981,Simonsen 2012. Unbelievable that someone so maligned as,a goalkeeper should have come forward to take the crucial penalty..only for the ball to land in Sheffield two hours later. Humiliating, just sums up our blasted curse.
 
For the 765th time, we didn't miss out on Europe in 1975. Even had we won at Birmingham, we would not have qualified.
To be fair, I'm expecting a few "that wasn't luck" comments. Personally, apart from Huddersfield, I don't think any of the play off finals were bad luck, more to do with the team playing like dog shit/not turning up*

*delete as applicable
 
For the 765th time, we didn't miss out on Europe in 1975. Even had we won at Birmingham, we would not have qualified.
So we did miss out then. We didn't qualify.
;)
 
It's nowt to do with luck, it's all to do with shit planning.

They constantly try to play hoofball with midgets that have no physical attributes.
They constantly try to play football with idiots who have no footballing attributes.

They don't buy better players when they're winning because in their own minds we are already good enough.
They panic buy shit that nobody else wants when we aren't playing well, just to get bodies in.

They invented the terms "Squad player", "Utility player" and "Versatile player" when we all know that these are polite terms for "Shit player"

They very, very, occasionally reach a semi final or play off final only to bore everyone senseless trying to steal it instead of trying to win it.

It's ok to lose an extremely important game at Wembley because they have a "Haven't we done well" attitude before we even kick off.

I'm also certain that each new manager gets running commentary from our clueless boardroom on how to do things the "BLAAAYYYYYDDDEESS WAAHHHYYYY" even though the BLAAAYYYYDDEESS WAAHHHYYY" has made our fans the most unhappy and critical of all the fans in the entire League.

They have provided a career for so many crap players in a shocking system that means they can earn a living out of football when they ought to be emptying the bins.

They have cleverly brainwashed fans into accepting that we will always be shit and that success is for everybody else, even if only occasionally.
We've won nowt for 90 years, fair enough, but the hard bit too swallow is that if we could fast forward another 90 years and every club of similar stature will have won something or qualified for Europe or spent a reasonable amount of that time in the Premier League......................We wont have.
 
I wouldn't say unlucky more cursed, maybe someone should piss on the corner flags. No other club comes so close but continually falls at the final hurdle.
I agree. We are cursed. 3-1 up on penalties v Huddersfield and still managed to lose shoot out. Relegation in 2007 was by a single goal. Do you remember not only did Unsworth score against us for Wigan in the last game but he missed 2 penalties for us v Blackburn earlier in the season so we dre 0-0 instead of winning. Also has any other team in football league history ever had their 35 goal striker sent to prison with 3 games to go when they are second in table with a 2 point (or was it 4 points?) cushion over 3rd placed team and then fail to get automatic promotion? If all these events are not evidence of a curse I don't know what is?
 

Inspired by Woodwardfan....

"Poll and Dean refereeing key games
Ched
Jags pen, Webber's miss.
Scudamore/ Richards stitch-up
23 penalties
No strikers in starting eleven at Wembley time and again -not all a matter of luck I suppose
Blackwell doing well as caretaker
scoring 5 away and losing on aggregate - no defence this time!"

They say that you make your own luck, but over the years, we blades, seem to have been dealt a crap hand when it comes to luck. Some may argue it isn't luck, but here are some other examples I can think of....

The penalties v Walsall 1981
FA Cup Semi 1993
FA Cup Semi 1998
FA Cup Semi 2003
League Cup Semi 2003
Play off finals - all of them? Certainly Huddersfield is the one that stands out.
Relegation 1987 including Hetherston's borderline supernatural ability to hit the woodwork (would have been brill at "crossbar challenge").
Relegation 1994 - Segers, corruption.
Relegation 2007 - Tevez, Jags, Unsworth penalties, Webber miss.
Going a lot further back you might also include...
Missing out on Europe 1975
Missing out on promotion to pigs on goal average 1950

Do all clubs have this luck or do we seem to have more bad luck than others?
The only "good luck" (if you can call it that) I can think of was when we got promoted in 1984 by virtue of scoring more goals than Hull when they could only win 2-0 in their final game.
Two more

1968. We got relegated... 20 years later Ernie Hunt revealed in a Sunday paper that Coventry bribed Southampton players not to win the match in the last game of the 1967-68 season. He said that near the end of the match, a Saints player had a chance that was easier to score than miss but very skilfully missed the sitter.

1962. We finished in 5th place, the FL nominated us, Everton (4th) and Burnley (2nd) to take part in the 1962-63 Fairs Cup but the Fairs Cup committee wanted Everton, Wendy (6th) and Birmingham (17th). Several meetings between the FL and the Fairs Cup committee tried to resolve the argument but in the end Everton was the only English entry in the 1962-63 Fairs Cup
 
Hulse missed one of the Blackburn pens. Three saves in that game, Kenny saved their pen too. As 0-0 games go it was pretty eventful.
 
Do you remember not only did Unsworth score against us for Wigan in the last game but he missed 2 penalties for us v Blackburn earlier in the season so we dre 0-0 instead of winning.

Unsworth missed one and Hulse the other penalty
 
I wouldn't say we were the unluckiest, it's more a result of poor ambition from successive boards. If they bought proper quality in - ie those type of players that turn up for the big games - we'd have done much better in play off finals and Cup semi finals. Instead our plucky triers get us so far without being good enough to take it any further. I always think of the 97-98 season as a prime example, if we'd have kept Deane, Fjortoft, Hutchison, Tiler and Ward we'd have been promoted as Champions and at least got to the Cup final and with it a guaranteed place in Europe.

The 'United Way' and it has been the case for 50 or 60 years, perhaps longer, is to sell the best player then spend about half the transfer fee on 2 or 3 players of less quality, if we're lucky. Thanks to our 4th rate board SUFC have punched below their weight for years.
 
Yes we are. I watched the 1997 play off final in my local up here in west yorks, where everyone else in the room was neutral but supporting us as they were bouyed by my enthusiasm, and as they were Yorkshiremen. Just before the end of normal time started to order another pint and that Hopkins goal went in. Couldn't cope with the sympathy on offer so just cancelled the pint and just trudged off home. Obviously not as bad as for those who went to Wembley but it were still "guttering" :(
 
I wouldn't say we were the unluckiest, it's more a result of poor ambition from successive boards. If they bought proper quality in - ie those type of players that turn up for the big games - we'd have done much better in play off finals and Cup semi finals. Instead our plucky triers get us so far without being good enough to take it any further. I always think of the 97-98 season as a prime example, if we'd have kept Deane, Fjortoft, Hutchison, Tiler and Ward we'd have been promoted as Champions and at least got to the Cup final and with it a guaranteed place in Europe.

The 'United Way' and it has been the case for 50 or 60 years, perhaps longer, is to sell the best player then spend about half the transfer fee on 2 or 3 players of less quality, if we're lucky. Thanks to our 4th rate board SUFC have punched below their weight for years.


If we had beaten Palace history could have been so different, who knows, we could have spent all the last years from then in the top flight?
 
Wow, reading this thread is a bit of an eye opener. Thought I knew pretty much all there is to know about our bad luck but just read stuff I didn't know.

The saying 'you make your own luck' in our case isn't strictly true. Over the years so many things have gone against us but the thing that stands out is how much of it was decided off the football pitch. Corruption, favouritism and downright indefensible decisions at the very top level of the game have scuppered us over the years.

Say what you liket to that but our history would be very different if not for that and we are due a HUGE slice of luck.

Just for once something must go our way eventually and we'll be the ones to benefit, instead of suffer because of the shortcomings of others.
 
Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory seems to be the norm for us Blades fan's that's for sure. I can't think of any other club with so much bad luck than ours tbh and in a weird sort of way it seems we've become accustomed to the expected failing's we have in the footballing world. However, here's the thing, considering all the kicks in the nuts we take we still follow the club come what may. Why do supporters ( particularly our's ) keep coming back for more and more importantly coming back in such good numbers??

Answer, because this particular club has a more passionate core running through it than almost any other club in the country by a mile. How many other clubs would get 20,000 in division 3 after 5 soul destroying seasons. Not many and that's a fact. A fact that every Blade should be proud of. I'm heading towards 5 decades of watching the Blades and like most Blades I've suffered the heartbreak times of play off failure's, relegation's and Deane & Fyortoft sold in the same week to name a few but like you, I've still supported the club because this club of our's has the most passionate fan's I have ever come across.

Give these fans a major cup final appearance and satisfaction for many will be enough. Give these fans a cup final Wembley victory and you'll see genuine celebration like no other has celebrated before.

Our time will come!... It's just a matter of WHEN?
 
Another one - beginning of 1939/40 season. Jimmy Hagan has not been long at BDTBL, we've just been promoted to the top flight and are sitting proudly on top of the league.

What happens? Hitler invades bloody Poland.

Sorry we can't blame McCabe for that one.
 
It's nowt to do with luck, it's all to do with shit planning.

They constantly try to play hoofball with midgets that have no physical attributes.
They constantly try to play football with idiots who have no footballing attributes.

They don't buy better players when they're winning because in their own minds we are already good enough.
They panic buy shit that nobody else wants when we aren't playing well, just to get bodies in.

They invented the terms "Squad player", "Utility player" and "Versatile player" when we all know that these are polite terms for "Shit player"

They very, very, occasionally reach a semi final or play off final only to bore everyone senseless trying to steal it instead of trying to win it.

It's ok to lose an extremely important game at Wembley because they have a "Haven't we done well" attitude before we even kick off.

I'm also certain that each new manager gets running commentary from our clueless boardroom on how to do things the "BLAAAYYYYYDDDEESS WAAHHHYYYY" even though the BLAAAYYYYDDEESS WAAHHHYYY" has made our fans the most unhappy and critical of all the fans in the entire League.

They have provided a career for so many crap players in a shocking system that means they can earn a living out of football when they ought to be emptying the bins.

They have cleverly brainwashed fans into accepting that we will always be shit and that success is for everybody else, even if only occasionally.
We've won nowt for 90 years, fair enough, but the hard bit too swallow is that if we could fast forward another 90 years and every club of similar stature will have won something or qualified for Europe or spent a reasonable amount of that time in the Premier League......................We wont have.
Sums them up perfectly.
 

Another one - beginning of 1939/40 season. Jimmy Hagan has not been long at BDTBL, we've just been promoted to the top flight and are sitting proudly on top of the league.

What happens? Hitler invades bloody Poland.

Sorry we can't blame McCabe for that one.

We could add Archduke Franz Ferdinand being shot by the Serbs in Sarajevo to kick start the World War I just as United had assembled a team capable of winning honours again (which they did a year later in 1915 with the FA Cup) including paying a British record fee to sign 'Nudger' Needham's replacement George Utley (see, pay for quality, win cups).
 

All advertisments are hidden for logged in members, why not log in/register?

All advertisments are hidden for logged in members, why not log in/register?

Back
Top Bottom