All joking aside, facing the reality of what we are facing next season, I'd quite happily take half the money & swap places with Coventry or Boro. It appears that we're making no attempt whatsoever to give it a real go. If we're intent on signing sub standard players, it's better to be in a sub standard league.
I know that PH has the ability to be selective in his facts and we might end up being bigger spenders than we are currently claiming, but all i'm seeing is a squad seriously lacking the required quality, a long season of struggle, moral sapping defeats and early relegation by a margin.
You can say that that's not too bad a thing when viewed in the context of our long term survival, but when the dust settles & we pick up the pieces, we'll have lost Berge & Ndiaye on frees, the collective moral of the squad will be damaged and the moral of the poor young/youth players that get asked to play a level or two above their capabilities will be destroyed. I don't want to see Jebbz, Osula or whoever, broken on the wheel, and turned into the next George Long just for the sake of it.
We'll be wandering the country getting beat every other week, paying top dollar for tickets, and praising the 'experience' and acting like the poor northern half of the family visiting their wealthy southern cousins.
And let's not fool ourselves that we're somehow keeping our powder dry for a momentous promotion push in 24/25, if the current budget is £20m, then the budget for 24/25 in the championship will be fuck all & we'll have a team lacking half it's players and any discernible quality.
To me, that is exactly what Sheffield United are and always have been. The quicker we unite as a fanbase and align ourselves behind the thought that this season is purely about fighting as an underdog to bloody as many noses as possible, the better the experience. Our essence lies in the fight and the journey, never the destination or the pay-off at the end of the rainbow.
Yes, we could be a car crash by 2025. But no dissertation about how unrealistic players we won’t get would infinitely improve our chances will change that.
Your analysis is one sound view of the future. There is other similarly sound views. Some of them might colour things more positively. All views of the future share one common feature, namely that none of us control the pieces that won‘t or need to fall into place.
We do not control or affect the future. What we can control is how we approach next year. Are we realistic that a fight for survival is inevitable and might be lost, but enjoy the battle? Or do we indulge in pre-emptive disappointment that our squad on paper will remain worse than Brentford, Forest or Southampton and feel like that means our owners sold us short?
We as fans are changing slowly from what we used to be, in my view. A lot of the self-deprecating gallow‘s humor has died as younger generations get somewhat more entitled and engage in punditry-style put-downs that are hedged both ways. Stuff
along the lines of „we can safeguard the club‘s future while pushing the boat out…“
We also have been cultivating online snipers whose real deal is not fun at football but fun (as they define it for themselves) on message boards or social media.
My personal take: The Prince and Hecky can’t do fairer than clearly stating that we are basically in Harry Bassett territory again. Fashion something out of misfits and gems for a season or two because neither of them currently have the required ridiculously deep pockets for this new-age Prem laugh.
Could it be better? Of course. But it is what it is. If I am not lied to, I can buy into another quintessentially Blades storyline here. I can enjoy backs to the wall from day one. I can swerve a few near certain disappointments on the road. And I look at about eight teams in the Prem, close my eyes, imagine us four months ago ten minutes after beating Wrexham, and confidently say „any of those eight at home, and I‘d fancy us at Bramall Lane in the cup, bowling them over.“
Our squad will be stronger than back then, so the list of possible wins gets longer. So personally I see no good in imagining myself depressed on the London tube on the way to Chelsea away. I will skip the match, and rather look forward to a new ground at Brentford, pondering a potential draw and a long night with the London Blades, regardless of the result. And yes, historically, it‘s often poured at Brentford , too…

