NEW: Kevin Blackwell interview

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Grecian2000 said:
Not sure I can be arsed to listen to him speak.

Obviously if anyone can post the answers to the only questions worth asking him I would happily read them.

1. What the fuck were you thinking playing Jordan Stewart (poor quality left back) on the right wing and leaving your usual whipping boy (David Cotterill, renowned right winger) against Newcastle?
2. When you had bugger all to spend why did you think buying Darius Henderson was any sort of idea?
3. Was your bullying of Sharpe and Cotterill beneficial to anyone other than your massive ego and, presumably, tiny penis?
4. Did you ever see Jonny Ertl play prior to signing him?
5. Did you think up the idea of playing every away game for a draw yourself or pinch it from Warnock's Premier League blueprint?

Loads more but my blood pressure is at a dangerously raised level just thinking about the cunts ugly fizzog.
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Johnny Ertle makes me shudder. Jordan Stewart kinda makes me smile in the way you watch a clown that bends down to pick a ball up but they keep kicking it away.

Sadly both were a sign that we were in a state of managed decline. The appearance of the angel of death to football clubs, Trevor Birch should have been a signal. I’m sure Blackwell was as popular for his crisis management at Leeds as much as being part of a more popular time of our history. At Leeds he managed to keep them competitive whilst they sold anything that wasn’t nailed down - which deserves some credit.

We were in the midst of a smaller scale break up but it was clear McCabe had shit himself re the budget and it was firesale time.

I’ll credit Blackwell in transforming the underachieving Robson squad to one that really looked the business at the back end of that season and we’re good to watch too. Getting third was a good achievement and we were robbed of a couple of pens in the play off final, things could have been very different. He also bored my tits off with crude percentage based football at times. Ultimately, as others have said, we wouldn’t have gone down that year had he stayed but it would have been grim.
 

CrookesBlade said:
Fair assessment.

The football was awful to watch, my main memory of that era is Stephen Quinn under instruction to hook the ball aimlessly over his head.

That said if we hadn’t sold Beattie we’d likely have been promoted in 2nd. We took it to the last day in 09.
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Yeah, I think some terrace wag nicknamed him Elpiton. Round us he was berated for doing it but I pointed out it’s clearly under instructions otherwise anyone else would be dropped for never taking a touch or looking up. It was a clear ‘kick it to a zone and press that area’ tactic.
 
Rooks said:
Ex players probably dislike him because they didn't always get their own way with him. Don't know of any ex managers who don't like him.
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The ex-players I’ve heard speak both first hand (I.e. people I know) and those I’ve heard in interviews elsewhere all refer to the way he acted with the younger players as the reason he was a dick.

I know one ex-player fairly well who wouldn’t piss on Blackwell if he were on fire. The bloke went on to have a good professional career outside of the Blades and was regarded as highly sought after during his time at the club. His treatment by Blackwell made him consider quitting football.
 
Part of me wants to watch it but I can guess already he will probably talk a load of bollocks and it would just would wind me up. Can't stand the guy. The talent he wasted was unreal.
 
Katzenjammer said:
A good man, unfairly maligned by wankers who wanted us to play pretty tippy tappy shite with no end product.

He wasn't great by any means, but he would never have taken us down, and I much preferred United under him than Adams, Clough and Adkins, that's for sure.
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Spot on

A very good man , met him quite a few times .

Doesn’t deserve the ridicule he gets
 
Superblades said:
Good interview that. Nice to see him pay compliments to people who haven’t had the best of words to say about him in their interviews in the past. I liked Blackwell as our manager, got us to within one game of the Prem and I think had we kept him in 10/11 then we wouldn’t have been relegated.
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The semi final performance at home to Preston was some of the best attacking football I can remember
 
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Nedski said:
If you're doing requests/taking suggestions, I'd be interested to hear Diego De Girolamo's story

EDIT: I should probably add I enjoyed this interview. I've never really heard him speak before, I've only heard other opinions on him which have always been extremely critical but to be fair he came across well and despite deflecting blame as much as possible, he didn't seem as arrogant as expected. Keep up the good work lads 👍
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We've tried Diego already. He's not keen at the moment. Thank you for your kind words too.
 
moody1889 said:
Anyone old enough to remember will have it etched in their memory when Kevin McCabe went on BBC Radio Sheffield and told bare faced lies and claimed that Beattie was going nowhere.

When in reality he was in Stoke and already on the verge of signing for Stoke.

Kevin McCabe was the ultimate bullsh*tter and played the fans like a fiddle.

Will never ever forget his Think Liverpool type investment 🙈
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While McCabe did speak of “game changing” it’s a fallacy that he said Think Liverpool. That was Jim Phipps.
 
YorkBlade said:
Kevin Blackwell looks back on his time as assistant manager, registered player, goalkeeping coach and manager of Sheffield United. He talks about the big personalities, some personal differences with certain people, his Blades highs/lows and ponders regrets. There's also a look at his time working abroad as well as some very interesting James Beattie insight.

WATCH:




You can also listen anywhere you get podcasts just search 'Sheff United Way' or direct links:

Spotify https://spoti.fi/2Wus1Hi
Apple https://apple.co/3DjI4IJ

Feedback always welcome.
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Enjoyed that, I know KB get's some stick off us and ex-players but he's come across pretty decent.
 
I can vividly remember Blackwell's interview after the Burnley match in the play offs. He said that he'd seen it before re play off defeats in terms of the breaking up of the squad and he was right on that. The season after we finished about 9th and Wednesday went down so that was a highlight! Ched signed that season but didn't do much and then got injured.

I also remember when Blackwell came in as a caretaker I was sceptical because I thought if he does well to the end of the season then no doubt he'll be appointed permanently, which he was and I wasn't sure he had the track record or managerial ability to be in for the long haul but top be fair he did well until the last season where it fell apart but he only had two or three games in fairness that season and McCabe was selling everything that moved. The board should have said thanks but no thanks at the end of the season where we finished 8th but that would have seemed harsh at the time, but to allow him to have another pre-season and bring in another 7 players or so (all frees) and then sack him just three games into the next season was madness.

McCabe takes a huge slice of the blame in my view for the failings at the time:

1 For appointing Blackwell as a permanent manager in the first place because his record was mixed at best, but granted he did do well at Leeds.
2 For selling everyone of value.
3 For sacking him just three matches into the season and appointing Gary Speed because he was a big name etc.
 
It was a good interview so appreciate the time and effort going in to making it. I thought it was quite telling that his abiding memory of the play off final is that we got done by poor refereeing, which whilst an argument could be made that on another day we could have had a penalty, that wasn't the reason we lost the game that day as it seems KB puts it down to. We lost because we didn't bother to turn up on the day and put in one of the most insipid play off final performances I've ever seen.
 

He was sacked because Kev had some prospective Thai buyers over for that game and will have filled their heads full of sunshine and lollipops, only to see his hopes dashed by being 3 down in half an hour and about 6000 walking out at h/t. Someone was getting the blame and it had to be Blacky.
 
raul said:
He was sacked because Kev had some prospective Thai buyers over for that game and will have filled their heads full of sunshine and lollipops, only to see his hopes dashed by being 3 down in half an hour and about 6000 walking out at h/t. Someone was getting the blame and it had to be Blacky.
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I was on London Rd after that game. The news that he'd been sacked was greeted with big celebrations, almost like we'd scored a goal. Everyone thought that better days were just around the corner.

Doubt the celebrations would have been as jubilant if we knew that we'd get through two more managers that season, drop into the third tier, see the pigs promoted at our expense and fail to achieve promotion in the next five seasons.
 
raul said:
He was sacked because Kev had some prospective Thai buyers over for that game and will have filled their heads full of sunshine and lollipops, only to see his hopes dashed by being 3 down in half an hour and about 6000 walking out at h/t. Someone was getting the blame and it had to be Blacky.
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Thai buyers you say? King Power or Tuna Fish?
 
Don't think you probed him enough about certain things to be honest, bit too nicey nicey for my liking, I've enjoyed a lot of your stuff, so I'm not just being an asshole, but would have been nice to ask him why so many didn't like his methods 😁
 
dazzlingblade said:
Don't think you probed him enough about certain things to be honest, bit too nicey nicey for my liking, I've enjoyed a lot of your stuff, so I'm not just being an asshole, but would have been nice to ask him why so many didn't like his methods 😁
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Without revealing too much of the boring 'behind the scenes' process. The original recording was over twice the length. Questions were asked that were a bit more probing but perhaps the answers weren't quite as illuminating as we'd have liked so they didn't make the final cut.
 
dazzlingblade said:
Don't think you probed him enough about certain things to be honest, bit too nicey nicey for my liking, I've enjoyed a lot of your stuff, so I'm not just being an asshole, but would have been nice to ask him why so many didn't like his methods 😁
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It’s tricky balance though.

He’s under no obligation to talk to Hal’s crew. You can hardly invite him to talk on a fans channel and then give him a load of aggressive questioning. Plus it would put others off appearing in the future.
 
It's been years and years and yet still, I'm not sure I can bring myself to watch this one. My overarching feeling to his time here is that he was largely useless and not very likeable.
 
YorkBlade said:
Without revealing too much of the boring 'behind the scenes' process. The original recording was over twice the length. Questions were asked that were a bit more probing but perhaps the answers weren't quite as illuminating as we'd have liked so they didn't make the final cut.
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That's fair enough, thanks for responding
 
Very good interview. Interesting reading the comments, he is someone who really does inspire ill feeling. I remember walking out of Wembley feeling more angry at him than I think I have ever felt towards any United manager. Funny though, I have no recollection of the semi final and how good we apparently were against Preston - a total blank in my mind.

It’s important to have guest like this though, it can’t all be back-slapping and remembering happy times. Let’s face it, most of our ex managers and players were involved in some horrendous teams and campaigns, more than good ones!
 
Will give this a listen later. Which ex-player was it who said they all called him "Diags" as that was all he ever shouted from the touchline? Have a feeling it may have been Jags.
 
I’ve listened to the interview and found it very interesting and it shed a bit of light on a few things.

I think the managers job was always a poisoned chalice for Blackwell. Consistently being sold to sell his best players and made to replace them on the cheap, and he kept us competitive. Nearly made the play offs towards the end of 07/08 after taking over in February when we was looking over our shoulder at relegation, and getting close to going up in 08/09 both automatically and then subsequently in the play offs. In the 08/09 play offs we didn’t have much more than Craig Beattie up top.

The football was sometimes dour at home and but I always remember some great away performances, in particular at Charlton, Barnsley a couple of time and a demolition of Cardiff away at Ninian Park

He might not have been everyone’s cup of tea but I think getting rid of him when did was a mistake as it wouldn’t have been pretty in 10/11 but he would have kept us up that season and I can think of about a dozen managers who have been worse for us
 
Booker4 said:
I can vividly remember Blackwell's interview after the Burnley match in the play offs. He said that he'd seen it before re play off defeats in terms of the breaking up of the squad and he was right on that. The season after we finished about 9th and Wednesday went down so that was a highlight! Ched signed that season but didn't do much and then got injured.

I also remember when Blackwell came in as a caretaker I was sceptical because I thought if he does well to the end of the season then no doubt he'll be appointed permanently, which he was and I wasn't sure he had the track record or managerial ability to be in for the long haul but top be fair he did well until the last season where it fell apart but he only had two or three games in fairness that season and McCabe was selling everything that moved. The board should have said thanks but no thanks at the end of the season where we finished 8th but that would have seemed harsh at the time, but to allow him to have another pre-season and bring in another 7 players or so (all frees) and then sack him just three games into the next season was madness.

McCabe takes a huge slice of the blame in my view for the failings at the time:

1 For appointing Blackwell as a permanent manager in the first place because his record was mixed at best, but granted he did do well at Leeds.
2 For selling everyone of value.
3 For sacking him just three matches into the season and appointing Gary Speed because he was a big name etc.
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True McCabe's decision making was awful but at the time I didn't give much thought to how much of a financial impact the recession at the time was having.

That said I doubt we needed to do a fire sale on the scale he did though and replacing players with mostly loan players isn't a wise move.
 

Whiston Blade said:
Enjoyed that, I know KB get's some stick off us and ex-players but he's come across pretty decent.
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I know it's an obvious excuse to use, selling players, but it's no coincidence that our most recent successful spells, Warnock and Wilder, were not during periods of us selling anything that was nailed down. Likewise Hecky has kept players and look at the results.

It's almost like constructing a house while someone isn't knocking out the foundations makes for a more stable structure!
 
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