Basham departing

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I suppose it was inevitable following Bash's injury and release by United his retirement would come as no surprise. I'm relieved he hasn't continued trying to play at a lower level and hope he doesn't change his mind. It's a sad day and I can't think of many other players that I have been able to relate to in the same way. There's so many 'fancy Dans' (a description given to Ronaldo by a Man Utd supporter friend) around these days and I'm glad to say Bash could never have been described in such terms.
He's one of the few people who could have got away with this back in 2019:-

Can't stand vaping but I make an exception in this case :D
Good luck to Bash and I'd love to see him back at Bramall Lane sometime in the future.
 
Been going to the lane for nearly 30 years (will mark my 30th on 10th September this year) and I have never loved a player as much as I love Bashambauer. Dedicated, hard, gives it his all, never give up. He epitomises what it is to be a Blade. Came up from the dark depths of League 1, all the way to 9th in the Premier League. Redefined what it is to be a central defender with his overlapping runs. A player who has limits, and knows them, and then goes and smashes the shit out of them anyway, just because he can.
A gentleman, a really nice bloke, a lynchpin of our rise from L1 to top half prem.

Enjoy your long and happy retirement Bashambauer. It will be a long time before we see your like again.

Legend.
 
Yep …the word ‘Legend’ is used far too easily these days….but for me Bash is worthy of that word. He literally gave everything for this club and lived all the ups & downs we had over those 10 years. He’ll always be welcome in S2 and should never ever have to buy a drink again.
 
Love everything about the man, even down to his woeful Klinsmann dives.

He doesn’t need a testimonial but would love to see that 18/19 side back at the lane for a charity match in the next few years so we can give them a proper send off. If they did a ‘blades heroes’ vs a ‘blades villains’ match (captained by Vardy, with Madine and Bannan in there somewhere) I geniunly think we’d sell out. I know I’d go! Cash to the children’s hospital.
 
My dad's favourite player from this era of Blades players, has been one of his favourites for the last few years alongside TC and Woodward.

Would love to see him recover enough to have a testemonial match (it took Morgan a few years to get one against NUFC), one of the best players I've seen at the lane and probably the first name on the teamsheet of my all time Blades XI, based on who ive seen play.
 

I will always love Bash. On seeing that caption though I did think he was about to share a post on what’s been going on in Israel and the Middle East, and when I then realised what it was actually about I did chuckle at the initial idea of it.
 

Chris Basham: Retirement and new routines with George Baldock forever in his thoughts​


Chris Basham is in a good place.

Seventeen months on from suffering one of the worst injuries the Premier League has seen, the former Sheffield United defender admits there have been dark days to go with the five operations to repair his shattered ankle.

None more so than the death of close friend — and ex-Bramall Lane team-mate — George Baldock last autumn.

But, after a Christmas that had its challenging moments, the 36-year-old is fully embracing retirement and a new life doing the school run with his three young children, cycling most days and, just recently, managing to complete a round of golf on foot for the first time since that fateful day at Fulham in October 2023.

“I’m getting into a routine of looking at my missus’ diary before I leave the house,” he says with a smile. “Working my schedule around that, which includes going to the gym and riding my bike.

“Getting out there in the fresh air is really good for my mental health. I’ll do 30-40kms, stopping for a coffee along the way. I’m basically managing the ankle, seeing what it can cope with and what it finds difficult. Just getting used to it. At night-time, I’ll do a bit of icing and see where I am the next day.

“A big thing was coming off the pain medication. I was still on them at Christmas when I was a bit down. So I decided to have my own ‘Dry January’. Not with the drink, but with the painkillers.

“I feel loads better. Spending time with the wife and family has been great. I take the kids to school and pick them up, something I’ve never been able to do before as I was always working. They can hold my hand going in, which I love.”

The dash down the right flank and cross that led to the end of Basham’s career was one he had performed countless times across 10 seasons in a Sheffield United shirt.

Christened ‘Bashambauer’ by fans as a nod to how comfortable he was at driving forward with the ball at his feet, he was a key cog in the overlapping centre-backs system that took the Yorkshire club from the bottom of League One to a ninth-place finish in the Premier League inside just four years.

So when Oliver Norwood curled a 30-yard pass down the wing at Craven Cottage, Basham, sporting the captain’s armband for Paul Heckingbottom’s side, immediately set off in pursuit. He caught the ball on the half-volley but, in doing so, all the weight shifted onto his calf and ankle.

As Basham collapsed in a heap, the damage to his lower left leg was evident immediately. So much so that Tim Ream, Fulham’s USMNT centre-back and the closest player to the incident, held his hand throughout the next 12 minutes before the United defender was carried off on a stretcher.

“I heard the initial crack and then looked at my leg on the floor,” he says. “That took my breath away. It felt like someone had thrown a boiling cup of coffee on my leg. All the lads were saying, ‘Lie down, lie down’. I knew it wasn’t right.”

Having been rushed to the nearest hospital, he was subsequently transferred to London’s Cleveland Clinic. Messages of support soon started to arrive, including calls from ex-pros such as Alan Shearer, who had endured bad injuries in their careers.
 
“The surgeon said the injury was more like something you’d see after a motorbike accident,” says Basham when asked about a road to recovery featuring those five operations.

“Number one was about getting the bone back in my body. I had to stay awake for that. Then, they put a metal plate through my leg, just to straighten things up and allow my body to get used to it. I went into a pot after that.

“I was in hospital for two weeks. I came out for four days but didn’t feel right. I went back to the hospital and it turned out the leg had become infected. So that was another three weeks in the hospital.

“I did say to my wife after the infection, ‘I just hope my leg can stay on’. I wasn’t too fussed about my career at this stage, more that I could enjoy a family life. I had a book that I wrote in about my feelings. How it felt to be back in hospital, what it was like to be away from the family again.

“My inner thoughts, really. Every day, I’d write about how I was. Not emotionally, more my body. I look back on it now and can’t believe how ill I was. I read it from time to time, just to show myself how far I’ve come.

“The last operation was to stretch my toes out because they had become clawed up and I had no feeling. The surgeon was fantastic. He released all the ligaments. Straight away, I knew it had worked.”

Basham, who confirmed his retirement a few weeks into this season, is full of praise for Sheffield United. His contract expired last June, but the medical staff continued to oversee his recovery, including physio sessions three times a week. United also provided the ice machine that allows their former defender to cool his ankle on an evening.

However, he admits to realising after his most recent operation in November that a break was needed from the club he served so magnificently after joining on a free transfer in 2014.

“Sheffield United have been brilliant,” he adds. “They keep wanting me to come down, but it was affecting me more than I realised. I’d find myself a little irritated driving home.

“I’d lost my good mate, as well. That took a lot out of me and all the lads. So, I decided I needed a clean break. I went back in after the last operation and told the physio I was going to have a breather. That was December. Now, we’re into February and I feel a lot better.”
 
“There’ll always be that hole for us all now.”

Basham is talking about last year’s tragic loss of Baldock, who drowned in his swimming pool at his home in Athens. The wing-back, like Basham a big part of United’s two most recent promotions to the Premier League, was just 31.

He had joined Panathinaikos in the summer after seven years at the Lane. The shock and pain over losing such a close friend is still evident, especially when talk turns to Baldock’s partner, Annabel, and the couple’s one-year-old son, Brody.

“It was Enda (Stevens) who texted to ask if I’d heard about George,” says Basham. “I had no idea. Horrible. I was distraught for his little lad. I couldn’t get him out of my mind at Christmas.

“Me and George sat next to each other in the dressing room for years. No 2 and No 6. Jack (O’Connell, who wore the No 5 shirt) didn’t want to be near either of us, so he sat elsewhere.

“Such a good lad. Fantastic in the dressing room at getting us going. We’d been speaking about meeting up (in Greece), me going out to watch him. I’m really close with George and Oli McBurnie (who plays for La Liga side Las Palmas in Gran Canaria), so planned to go watch them both. We’d pencilled it in and then this happened.”

Basham is momentarily silent, before adding: “The turnout at his funeral was amazing. Showed how much respect he had. So sad. We have all these group chats and George’s number is still in them.

“A lot of the lads have really struggled. The manager (Chris Wilder), the same. I remember the gaffer saying, ‘I’ve lost one of my lads’. You just have to remember the good times.

“What we have to do is make sure his son never forgets who his dad was as a person. And a footballer.”

Baldock’s place in United folklore is assured. As is that of Basham, after 394 appearances to go with those three promotions and two Player of the Year awards. He is surely the only ex-player to have a position named after him at the Lane to go with that Franz Beckenbauer-inspired nickname, something he admitted in 2020 makes him immensely proud.

Reaching the Premier League was the pinnacle for someone released by Newcastle United at 16, who subsequently went to work at McDonald’s before relaunching his career with, first, Bolton Wanderers and then Blackpool.

The Athletic is sitting with Basham just a few miles down the A1 from where he used to flip those burgers. We are in a coffee shop, not far from the family home he shares with his wife, Joanna, and their children, Luke (10), Ethan (six) and Emmi-rose (four).
 
But mention of the ‘Chris Basham Role’ — the right overlapping side of a back three — inevitably takes the mind straight back to those days when Wilder and assistant Alan Knill devised a ground-breaking system destined to propel United up the divisions.

“The first time we played it was at Gillingham in League One,” says Basham, referring to a 2-1 win in September 2015. “He pulled us during the week, knowing I was a midfielder, really, but had also played in defence under (previous United manager) Nigel Clough.

“He says, ‘I’m switching to a three, but I don’t want you in a flat three, I want to use your energy to get up and down the pitch’. His thinking was, ‘The more you get the overload out wide and bring the striker back with you, the more he’s got to do to score’.

“After winning 2-1 at Gillingham, we never looked back. We won the league with 100 points that first year. We then surprised a few in the Championship and, by the time we reached the Premier League, we knew the system inside out and were full of confidence.

“We played on the edge and that was down to the manager. He didn’t want us sitting in, trying to eke out a goal. He wanted us to play in the Premier League exactly like we had in the Championship and League One.”

Wilder is back in charge of United. Basham has watched his old club a few times this season, most recently on New Year’s Day away at Sunderland. He is eyeing next month’s Sheffield derby and a possible visit as an away fan to a stadium where he helped United to a famous win that will forever be known in the city as the ‘Bouncing Day Massacre’ in honour of goalscorer Mark Duffy.

“I’d love to get a feeling of what we did there in the 4-2,” he says about that possible return to Hillsborough.

As for his next chapter, Basham adds: “I’m excited to see what happens next. I’ve done a bit of media (with Sky Sports and BBC Radio Sheffield) and really enjoyed that.

“Above all, though, I’m most enjoying being there for the family. There were a few phone calls in January. Basically to see where I was at. I’m not saying ‘no’ to opportunities. More that, at the moment, I’m enjoying getting used to life.

“Just being a normal dad, a normal guy.”
 
dc_blade said:
But mention of the ‘Chris Basham Role’ — the right overlapping side of a back three — inevitably takes the mind straight back to those days when Wilder and assistant Alan Knill devised a ground-breaking system destined to propel United up the divisions.

“The first time we played it was at Gillingham in League One,” says Basham, referring to a 2-1 win in September 2015. “He pulled us during the week, knowing I was a midfielder, really, but had also played in defence under (previous United manager) Nigel Clough.

“He says, ‘I’m switching to a three, but I don’t want you in a flat three, I want to use your energy to get up and down the pitch’. His thinking was, ‘The more you get the overload out wide and bring the striker back with you, the more he’s got to do to score’.

“After winning 2-1 at Gillingham, we never looked back. We won the league with 100 points that first year. We then surprised a few in the Championship and, by the time we reached the Premier League, we knew the system inside out and were full of confidence.

“We played on the edge and that was down to the manager. He didn’t want us sitting in, trying to eke out a goal. He wanted us to play in the Premier League exactly like we had in the Championship and League One.”

Wilder is back in charge of United. Basham has watched his old club a few times this season, most recently on New Year’s Day away at Sunderland. He is eyeing next month’s Sheffield derby and a possible visit as an away fan to a stadium where he helped United to a famous win that will forever be known in the city as the ‘Bouncing Day Massacre’ in honour of goalscorer Mark Duffy.

“I’d love to get a feeling of what we did there in the 4-2,” he says about that possible return to Hillsborough.

As for his next chapter, Basham adds: “I’m excited to see what happens next. I’ve done a bit of media (with Sky Sports and BBC Radio Sheffield) and really enjoyed that.

“Above all, though, I’m most enjoying being there for the family. There were a few phone calls in January. Basically to see where I was at. I’m not saying ‘no’ to opportunities. More that, at the moment, I’m enjoying getting used to life.

“Just being a normal dad, a normal guy.”
Click to expand...

Great read.

Thanks for posting it dc
 
dc_blade said:
But mention of the ‘Chris Basham Role’ — the right overlapping side of a back three — inevitably takes the mind straight back to those days when Wilder and assistant Alan Knill devised a ground-breaking system destined to propel United up the divisions.

“The first time we played it was at Gillingham in League One,” says Basham, referring to a 2-1 win in September 2015. “He pulled us during the week, knowing I was a midfielder, really, but had also played in defence under (previous United manager) Nigel Clough.

“He says, ‘I’m switching to a three, but I don’t want you in a flat three, I want to use your energy to get up and down the pitch’. His thinking was, ‘The more you get the overload out wide and bring the striker back with you, the more he’s got to do to score’.

“After winning 2-1 at Gillingham, we never looked back. We won the league with 100 points that first year. We then surprised a few in the Championship and, by the time we reached the Premier League, we knew the system inside out and were full of confidence.

“We played on the edge and that was down to the manager. He didn’t want us sitting in, trying to eke out a goal. He wanted us to play in the Premier League exactly like we had in the Championship and League One.”

Wilder is back in charge of United. Basham has watched his old club a few times this season, most recently on New Year’s Day away at Sunderland. He is eyeing next month’s Sheffield derby and a possible visit as an away fan to a stadium where he helped United to a famous win that will forever be known in the city as the ‘Bouncing Day Massacre’ in honour of goalscorer Mark Duffy.

“I’d love to get a feeling of what we did there in the 4-2,” he says about that possible return to Hillsborough.

As for his next chapter, Basham adds: “I’m excited to see what happens next. I’ve done a bit of media (with Sky Sports and BBC Radio Sheffield) and really enjoyed that.

“Above all, though, I’m most enjoying being there for the family. There were a few phone calls in January. Basically to see where I was at. I’m not saying ‘no’ to opportunities. More that, at the moment, I’m enjoying getting used to life.

“Just being a normal dad, a normal guy.”
Click to expand...
Thank you, that’s a really good read
 
Thanks for posting - my favourite ever United player - opitomised that era. Would love him back in some capacity once he's ready to.
 

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