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It used to be a working men’s club. In truth it still looks a venue more suited to drinking subsidised ale and suffering yet another turn grappling with Simply The Best than a hotbed of Premier League football, but looks aren’t everything. It’s here, at Sheffield United’s training ground, situated on a former council estate on the outskirts of the city centre that English football’s most unlikely revolution of recent years was plotted.
When he wasn’t a ballboy, Chris Wilder stood on United’s imposing Shoreham Street end as a kid. As a young man, he played more than 100 games for them at full-back. Although it’s a cliché, as a 51-year-old, if he didn’t manage United, he’d still be watching them. Appointing a fan as manager is usually a cheap, eventually tear-stained option, but Wilder returned to Bramall Lane in 2016 having made his managerial bones elsewhere: taking Oxford United back into the Football League and Northampton Town into League One. Three seasons and two promotions later, Wilder is the most successful English manager (“for now,” he cautions) and United are eating at the top table for the first time since 2007.
United’s front-foot approach, where centre-backs Jack O’Connell and John Egan were often found hurtling down the wings, was a Championship revelation. Things round here will be different this season.
“It would be foolish to change how I manage and how we play,” Wilder insists, over the hubbub of contractors crafting another United training pitch. “This is us. So while we’re not going to take a wrecking ball to anything, we all have to up our game. Certainly, I’ve got to have a word with myself and perhaps not be quite so gung-ho, but if we’re going to pick up points in the hardest division in the world, we have to score goals.”
Last summer, newly promoted Fulham wholly rebuilt their team. Fellow arrivals Cardiff City mostly stuck with their promotion winners. Both went down. Mindful of both examples, United have taken a third way. Billy Sharpe, O’Connell, Enda Stevens, Kieron Freeman, John Fleck, Chris Basham, Mark Duffy, Simon Moore, Jake Wright and Leon Clarke have taken the two-promotions journey with Wilder. Not all will make the Premier League grade (“I can’t show sentiment”) and Wilder has recruited accordingly.
Old boy Phil Jagielka has returned: “he was only kept out of Everton’s team by £35m Michael Keane and Kurt Zouma. I wanted an experienced player and I know him inside out”. Lys Mousset, who failed to break into Bournemouth’s team in three years (“ah, but they wanted him to stay and look who was keeping him out: Callum Wilson and Josh King”), has arrived as a target man.
Most interesting of all is Ravel Morrison, a maverick in a set-up that is proudly collective, who hasn’t started a Premier League game since 2013 and has been in the last chance saloon since opening time. Morrison offers something United don’t have: an unpredictable game-changer. Off the pitch, there is enough baggage to engulf a Heathrow terminal.
“Talk about that past all you like,” says Wilder, “but I’d much rather talk about what we can do with him in the future. Things happen when you’re a young lad; young lads make wrong decisions. He understands he won’t get many more opportunities like this and that he has to do his part. On the character side, I’ve spoken to players who’ve played with him and managers who’ve managed him and the response has been overwhelmingly positive. He’s started well and he’s integrating with the other players.”
Indeed, Morrison was last sighted in Sweden at Ostersunds and perhaps a corner has been turned. “We only have good things to say about him,” said Ostersunds spokesman Niclas Lidstrom. “He’s a good guy and it was nice to have him here with us. We were discussing a new contract, but we’re glad for him now he is in the Premier League.”
“But there’s another side to this,” continues Wilder. “It’s not just about Ravel; it’s about us too. We have to work as hard as him to make it work. Players aren’t robots: Ravel is different to Sharpe, who’s different to Basham and you treat them accordingly. If Ravel works out, we’ve got one hell of a player on our hands, somebody who can make the group better.”
Like Jurgen Klopp, Wilder was born in 1967, started his managerial career in 2001 and has never been sacked. Unlike Klopp, though, Wilder came into management via a Sunday League team (Bradway of Sheffield’s Meadowhall Sunday League), from where even Alfreton Town was a mighty step up. Not one to look back, he claims not to remember his first Alfreton game (a 2-1 Northern Counties East Premier Division victory over Thackley), but he will look forwards, even if that means the relegation so many tip his team for.
“If it happens, we’ll deal with it,” he says. “But we want to become that team who’re difficult to play against, the team who surprise and shock. We’re not frightened of relegation, just like we weren’t frightened of promotion: when the pressure was on, everybody talked about bottle, who’d crumble and who’d collapse: it certainly wasn’t us.
“What’s happened to us hasn’t been off the cuff, you know. I don’t want to be a one-season wonder. I want us to get a foothold in this division and establish ourselves. Then we can really move things forwards.”
When he wasn’t a ballboy, Chris Wilder stood on United’s imposing Shoreham Street end as a kid. As a young man, he played more than 100 games for them at full-back. Although it’s a cliché, as a 51-year-old, if he didn’t manage United, he’d still be watching them. Appointing a fan as manager is usually a cheap, eventually tear-stained option, but Wilder returned to Bramall Lane in 2016 having made his managerial bones elsewhere: taking Oxford United back into the Football League and Northampton Town into League One. Three seasons and two promotions later, Wilder is the most successful English manager (“for now,” he cautions) and United are eating at the top table for the first time since 2007.
United’s front-foot approach, where centre-backs Jack O’Connell and John Egan were often found hurtling down the wings, was a Championship revelation. Things round here will be different this season.
“It would be foolish to change how I manage and how we play,” Wilder insists, over the hubbub of contractors crafting another United training pitch. “This is us. So while we’re not going to take a wrecking ball to anything, we all have to up our game. Certainly, I’ve got to have a word with myself and perhaps not be quite so gung-ho, but if we’re going to pick up points in the hardest division in the world, we have to score goals.”
Last summer, newly promoted Fulham wholly rebuilt their team. Fellow arrivals Cardiff City mostly stuck with their promotion winners. Both went down. Mindful of both examples, United have taken a third way. Billy Sharpe, O’Connell, Enda Stevens, Kieron Freeman, John Fleck, Chris Basham, Mark Duffy, Simon Moore, Jake Wright and Leon Clarke have taken the two-promotions journey with Wilder. Not all will make the Premier League grade (“I can’t show sentiment”) and Wilder has recruited accordingly.
Old boy Phil Jagielka has returned: “he was only kept out of Everton’s team by £35m Michael Keane and Kurt Zouma. I wanted an experienced player and I know him inside out”. Lys Mousset, who failed to break into Bournemouth’s team in three years (“ah, but they wanted him to stay and look who was keeping him out: Callum Wilson and Josh King”), has arrived as a target man.
Most interesting of all is Ravel Morrison, a maverick in a set-up that is proudly collective, who hasn’t started a Premier League game since 2013 and has been in the last chance saloon since opening time. Morrison offers something United don’t have: an unpredictable game-changer. Off the pitch, there is enough baggage to engulf a Heathrow terminal.
“Talk about that past all you like,” says Wilder, “but I’d much rather talk about what we can do with him in the future. Things happen when you’re a young lad; young lads make wrong decisions. He understands he won’t get many more opportunities like this and that he has to do his part. On the character side, I’ve spoken to players who’ve played with him and managers who’ve managed him and the response has been overwhelmingly positive. He’s started well and he’s integrating with the other players.”
Indeed, Morrison was last sighted in Sweden at Ostersunds and perhaps a corner has been turned. “We only have good things to say about him,” said Ostersunds spokesman Niclas Lidstrom. “He’s a good guy and it was nice to have him here with us. We were discussing a new contract, but we’re glad for him now he is in the Premier League.”
“But there’s another side to this,” continues Wilder. “It’s not just about Ravel; it’s about us too. We have to work as hard as him to make it work. Players aren’t robots: Ravel is different to Sharpe, who’s different to Basham and you treat them accordingly. If Ravel works out, we’ve got one hell of a player on our hands, somebody who can make the group better.”
Like Jurgen Klopp, Wilder was born in 1967, started his managerial career in 2001 and has never been sacked. Unlike Klopp, though, Wilder came into management via a Sunday League team (Bradway of Sheffield’s Meadowhall Sunday League), from where even Alfreton Town was a mighty step up. Not one to look back, he claims not to remember his first Alfreton game (a 2-1 Northern Counties East Premier Division victory over Thackley), but he will look forwards, even if that means the relegation so many tip his team for.
“If it happens, we’ll deal with it,” he says. “But we want to become that team who’re difficult to play against, the team who surprise and shock. We’re not frightened of relegation, just like we weren’t frightened of promotion: when the pressure was on, everybody talked about bottle, who’d crumble and who’d collapse: it certainly wasn’t us.
“What’s happened to us hasn’t been off the cuff, you know. I don’t want to be a one-season wonder. I want us to get a foothold in this division and establish ourselves. Then we can really move things forwards.”
