Significance of 42 points from 20 games...

[Revolution]

I don’t get this sentiment that because we’re Sheffield United we’ll fuck it up. It doesn’t bear much scrutiny. We do tend to fuck up in one off games - cup semi finals and playoffs. But we actually have a decent record of winning automatic promotion races.

It’s also not something that Wilder does.

 

[mattbianco1]

Only two teams in the last 15 years have failed to get promoted of the 25 teams with 40+ points from 20 games

United:

 

[Dkc]

These stats look reassuring at first glance but the past 15 years seems quite an arbitary and selective cut-off point. The Play Offs and 3 points for a win were introduced in the 80's. Could be that recently there have been more front-runners that have stayed the course but in the broader picture more teams drop off.

 

[Steve Mackan]

On the noise / atmosphere point, I get it I’m afraid.

Although we’re smashing this season, I think there’s a collective reservation that’s natural to Blade’s fans, that we’ll mess it up somehow.

But, more pertinently, there is definitely something of a collective hangover from last season, for me especially, that’s completely drained me of excitement for football in general. This is something that gets better with results and performances naturally, but there’s the black cloud of another potentially bad PL season on the horizon.

Personally, I’m starting to enjoy it again with an attitude of hopefully we’ll have learned from last season should we be promoted, but I don’t blame the fan base for a collective lack of optimism about playing against the big boys again.

We’re just unfortunately in that position of being a yo-yo team, so the highs are high and the lows are low. The difference being, the lows at this level aren’t on the global stage, and no matter how much you love the club, it’s never going to be exciting getting schooled and criticised by everyone in the top flight.

Just my two cents.

I feel like it’s more entitlement as a hangover from last season. The bigger boys bullied us, so we should now be bullying the littler lads. I don’t know. Just a hunch. But the sorts of comments I was hearing at Millwall were just pathetically dour.

 

[Steve Mackan]

Bring back the Steve Mackan match day diaries! Does he still have ownership of the Nissan Cube? I’m eager to find out.

We’re in negotiations… he’s not cheap

 

[OldBillBlade]

On the noise / atmosphere point, I get it I’m afraid.

Although we’re smashing this season, I think there’s a collective reservation that’s natural to Blade’s fans, that we’ll mess it up somehow.

But, more pertinently, there is definitely something of a collective hangover from last season, for me especially, that’s completely drained me of excitement for football in general. This is something that gets better with results and performances naturally, but there’s the black cloud of another potentially bad PL season on the horizon.

Personally, I’m starting to enjoy it again with an attitude of hopefully we’ll have learned from last season should we be promoted, but I don’t blame the fan base for a collective lack of optimism about playing against the big boys again.

We’re just unfortunately in that position of being a yo-yo team, so the highs are high and the lows are low. The difference being, the lows at this level aren’t on the global stage, and no matter how much you love the club, it’s never going to be exciting getting schooled and criticised by everyone in the top flight.

Just my two cents.

Totally agree on this. For all this fantastic ride this current season may present, the reward for success is the more than likely a depressing season next year.

 

[Geordie Blade]

We do tend to fuck up in one off games - cup semi finals and playoffs.

The play-offs one is probably just about fair. But the cup semi finals is a bit harsh. They are semi-finals for a reason - we were up against very tough opposition.

FA Cup
1993: Lost to Wednesday, who finished 7th in the top flight (we finished 14th in the top flight)
1998: Lost to Newcastle, who finished 13th in the top flight (we finished 6th in the second flight)
2003: Lost to Arsenal, who finished 2nd in the top flight (we finished 3rd in the second flight)
2014: Lost to Hull, who finished 16th in the top flight (we finished 7th in the third flight)
2023: Lost to Man City, who finished 1st in the top flight (we finished 2nd in the second flight)

League Cup
2003: Lost to Liverpool, who finished 5th in the top flight (we finished 3rd in the second flight)
2015: Lost to Spurs, who finished 5th in the top flight (we finished 5th in the third flight)

It's a bit harsh to call any of those 'fuck ups'. All against top flight teams when we were in lower divisions (apart from 1993).

Also important to remember that we turned up in the quarter-final matches to get to those semis, so we can win 'big' one-off games.

 

[Selly]

These stats look reassuring at first glance but the past 15 years seems quite an arbitary and selective cut-off point. The Play Offs and 3 points for a win were introduced in the 80's. Could be that recently there have been more front-runners that have stayed the course but in the broader picture more teams drop off.

the flip side of this is that the Championship is more skewed now towards the teams with parachute payments than it ever has been. So recent experience is probably more relevant than when we went up in 1990 (for instance)

 

[munksyb]

I'm confident we can & probably will be promoted
I think we are playing exciting football
I rejoice every goal & win

But I do find it hard to get excited about being in the Premiership, that's where my reservations come

Let's hope the takeover goes through, and gives Wilder what he needs to put us on a stable footing when we get promoted, and show that teams can be succesfull in the premiership without spending multi-millions on prima-donas, but can rely on a balance of realistic transfer fees /wages and LOYALTY to the team & supporters

 

[Nick Jansky]

The play-offs one is probably just about fair. But the cup semi finals is a bit harsh. They are semi-finals for a reason - we were up against very tough opposition.

FA Cup
1993: Lost to Wednesday, who finished 7th in the top flight (we finished 14th in the top flight)
1998: Lost to Newcastle, who finished 13th in the top flight (we finished 6th in the second flight)
2003: Lost to Arsenal, who finished 2nd in the top flight (we finished 3rd in the second flight)
2014: Lost to Hull, who finished 16th in the top flight (we finished 7th in the third flight)
2023: Lost to Man City, who finished 1st in the top flight (we finished 2nd in the second flight)

League Cup
2003: Lost to Liverpool, who finished 5th in the top flight (we finished 3rd in the second flight)
2015: Lost to Spurs, who finished 5th in the top flight (we finished 5th in the third flight)

It's a bit harsh to call any of those 'fuck ups'. All against top flight teams when we were in lower divisions (apart from 1993).

Also important to remember that we turned up in the quarter-final matches to get to those semis, so we can win 'big' one-off games.

I don't disagree. My point was that we don't always fuck up.

 

[dexter101]

I am so proud of where we have got to so far this season, and I know everyone else seems to expect that we should be straight back up but it does feel to me like our squad are over delivering in terms of results. Its not a criticism, but we seem to have the ability to sneak a goal even when things aren't really doing our way (like Wednesday night).

Burnley seem to be the same, just can't sneak goals in the same way.

Weird thing is, I can't see us stopping and if anything the idea of this squad clicking is frightening. Tom Davies a month ago people were suggesting he was a bench warmer if that. Blaster has out for the season but (again no criticism of him) we have somehow kept going without losing momentum.

I can't think beyond the next game but 9 months ago, some were saying we would be at a scrap at the other end of the table.

 

[Pollingtonblade]

We are going up and we are going to probably get 100 points, there is loads of dross in this division, we will beat most of the teams below 6th quite comfortably.

 

[Blade56]

Way I see it is anoth 8 points and we’re safe

 

[Sheffsteel]

The play-offs one is probably just about fair. But the cup semi finals is a bit harsh. They are semi-finals for a reason - we were up against very tough opposition.

FA Cup
1993: Lost to Wednesday, who finished 7th in the top flight (we finished 14th in the top flight)
1998: Lost to Newcastle, who finished 13th in the top flight (we finished 6th in the second flight)
2003: Lost to Arsenal, who finished 2nd in the top flight (we finished 3rd in the second flight)
2014: Lost to Hull, who finished 16th in the top flight (we finished 7th in the third flight)
2023: Lost to Man City, who finished 1st in the top flight (we finished 2nd in the second flight)

League Cup
2003: Lost to Liverpool, who finished 5th in the top flight (we finished 3rd in the second flight)
2015: Lost to Spurs, who finished 5th in the top flight (we finished 5th in the third flight)

It's a bit harsh to call any of those 'fuck ups'. All against top flight teams when we were in lower divisions (apart from 1993).

Also important to remember that we turned up in the quarter-final matches to get to those semis, so we can win 'big' one-off games.

There's also the FA cup semi final + reply against Leicester in 1961.
(we finished 2nd in the 2nd division but Leicester were the favourites finishing 6th in the top flight).
So that's a run of 7 (SEVEN) consecutive fa cup semi finals we've failed to win.

Regards the recent FA cup semi finals I really thought 2003 was going to be our year to qualify for Europe.

The 4 teams in the semis were Arsenal, Watford, Southampton and Sheff Utd.
Arsenal were easily the best team finishing 2nd in the top flight, Southampton finished 8th in the top flight
We finished 3rd in the Championship and Watford were the weakest team finishing 13th in the Championship.

Remember at the time, the winners of the FA cup automatically qualified for Europe
but if that team (for example Arenal) had already qualified into Europe, then the loser in the final played in Europe instead.

Thought if we draw Watford then we are almost gauranteed a cup final and we we met Arsenal in the final, even if we lost we'd still qualify for Europe.
I even fancied our chances if we'd drawn Southampton in the semi's.

but incredible bad luck, 1 in 3 chance, and we draw the big favourites to win the competition.
Still gave them a great game in the semi final at Old Trafford, not many chances but they scored that controversial goal where the ref blocked our player.
Then right at the end Seaman did that unbelievable save (Seaman says it's his best ever save) from Pescisolido header.

 

[Houston_Blade]

You're also forgetting this is Sheffield United and we are capable of finding hitherto new and undiscovered ways of fucking up.

Joking aside, we keep digging out results without playing that well, certainly not for sustained periods and that's always the sign of a successful team. I do still think the squad is a bit thin and with Blaster out for the rest of the season and the injury records of Davies and Brewster, I think we need reinforcements in January if we are to seriously challenge for automatic, particularly another strong central midfielder and a forward/striker. I never thought I'd say it after last season, but if Vini is out for a prolonged period, that would leave a big hole in the midfield to fill.

Wilder has said as much in his comments a couple of weeks ago about the takeover saga.

Over the last couple of promotions we seem to have overcome this, we now only fuck up spectacularly in the PL but seem fairly efficient at getting over the line in Championship.

I enjoyed monitoring the % likelihood tables last time around as they shifted weekly, in the end we pulled away from the pack and went up comfortably.

The key always seems to be in the top 2 at Christmas, then you have to ‘do a Leeds’ if you want to miss out.

 

[YES Blade]

Over the last couple of promotions we seem to have overcome this, we now only fuck up spectacularly in the PL but seem fairly efficient at getting over the line in Championship.

I enjoyed monitoring the % likelihood tables last time around as they shifted weekly, in the end we pulled away from the pack and went up comfortably.

The key always seems to be in the top 2 at Christmas, then you have to ‘do a Leeds’ if you want to miss out.

I think there are still some scars from the League One Ched season, which is understandable given the unlikely circumstances we lost our top scorer and who pipped us to 2nd.

But generally speaking we’ve got good pedigree for getting over the line for automatics.

End of the day this is a completely different team to those of the past so history is pretty irrelevant anyway.