Why did it go so wrong?

All advertisments are hidden for logged in members, why not log in/register?




Bruce Wayne said:
I am crying about nothing. I just see the Blades as being a club capable of matching the likes of the mighty Bournemouth with a board that shows some ambition. January was hailed a success, no it fucking wasn't it was a cheap as chips L1 fodder window. Stop kidding yourself, we should be a big player but we have a small mindset that seems to have been embedded into minds like yours due to the '6 years in L1' bollocks (I know it's a fact, but it's still bollocks). Think bigger.
Click to expand...

Matching the mighty Bournemouth? Do you mean with back to back promotions? You may have noticed that not many other clubs have managed to do that. It’s not a slight on us that we probably won’t.

If you mean ‘matching the mighty Bournemouth by being in the Premiership then I agree but realism says that after 6 years in league 1 it might take us more than 1 season to achieve that. It isn’t small mindedness to say that.

You seem to be one of those people who wants everything yesterday and throws his toys out of the pram when it doesn’t happen.

You also know nothing of my mindset. It would be easy for me to come on here and say “we should have spent £10m in January”, that doesn’t mean that anyone who can see the flaws in that plan doesn’t want us to succeed. Show me one person who is happy that it looks like we’ll miss out on the playoffs.

Improvement year on year is what us fans should be expecting. So far we’ve been managing that. Next season is where we need to show improvement again.
 
I was thinking last night about Millwall and there sudden surge at the business end of the season. Have they bought many this season ? I know little about other teams but thought they’d stuck with the same side pretty much like we have.

Our decline as the season has gone on is fairly common for promoted teams, but Millwall, who started with indifferent form have suddenly got going without (to my knowledge) buying several players in January. You’d expect a team that’s newly promoted, without big recruitment, that started the season with average form to still be sort of middle to lower end of the table, but they have improved as the season has gone on, how !? Maybe younger legs up top, more clinical strikers perhaps ? We were much better than them last season, so it’s strange.
 
Rob86 said:
I was thinking last night about Millwall and there sudden surge at the business end of the season. Have they bought many this season ? I know little about other teams but thought they’d stuck with the same side pretty much like we have.

Our decline as the season has gone on is fairly common for promoted teams, but Millwall, who started with indifferent form have suddenly got going without (to my knowledge) buying several players in January. You’d expect a team that’s newly promoted, without big recruitment, that started the season with average form to still be sort of middle to lower end of the table, but they have improved as the season has gone on, how !? Maybe younger legs up top, more clinical strikers perhaps ? We were much better than them last season, so it’s strange.
Click to expand...

You’ve got to assume that they spent millions in January but just didn’t tell anyone about it
 
Damski said:
It didn't "go wrong". We had previously been in the 3rd tier for 6 years. Survival was the brief this season, and any of us would have taken 21st place at the start of the season. A top half finish was unthinkable in August.

But we did way better than that. We stormed to the top of the league in our first season back, and only dropped out of the top 6 a few weeks ago. We secured survival around new year, got the biggest win against Them Lot in a generation, stuffed Dirty Leeds twice and generally had some bloody good results, all with a squad which on paper, should be struggling against relegation.

With 5 games to go, we are a few points off top 6, and though I don't think we'll make it, the fact we're even in that situation is a brilliant result. We have overacheived significantly. Yes, it's disappointing that we haven't kept up that superb early season form. But we shouldn't let that take anything away from what Sheffield United has acheived in the last 18 months. It has been nothing short of meteoric. Nothing has gone wrong, and more importantly, a LOT has gone right.
Click to expand...

On a thread full of the usual suspects posting the same owd, same owd, congratulations on smashing it - that’s 40 likes right there.
 
Nicolaus_Copernicus said:
I respect your opinion EC, but I disagree. It's this kind of attitude that keeps us where we are; I doubt concerns about punching & weight were discussed at swansea, bournemouth, burnley, huddersfield, etc when they were on the way up. Nor are Millwall currently agonising about their over performance. They just get on with it. I agree with what our expectations should've been at season's start, mine were avoid relegation and two dickings by the pigs, but they dramatically altered between August & December and the board should've acted accordingly. Up to and including Coutts injury, it should have been apparent that the fates had conspired to give us a serious chance of promotion this season. Since then, the wheels have slowly fallen off and we are now faced with some uncomfortable questions/home truths going forward. By the look of it we peaked as a club in early December and there now has to be a rapid intervention both on & off the pitch to short the current malaise out. Because as it stands, we're totally out of form, it's relegation form and we are now losing to the crap of the division, 6 of the first 16 are 32 yrs old or over, Coutts might not be firing on all cylinders until 2019, we've gone for quantity over quality in our purchases (some of which are baffling), we have a squad the majority of which has little/no resale value and an ownership issue which appears to be heading for litigation. The result of which appears to be a choice between a kick in the balls or a poke in the eye. An owner without the money to invest or an owner that can't afford to buy the bricks & mortar. There is no brighter day on the horizon, there is no 'go again stronger next season', next season is shaping up to be one of shit & pain. We as a club do not learn, we do not take our opportunities when the are presented and we are now reliant of CW pulling some big fucking rabbits out of a very small hat in close season or squeezing the last remaining pips out of our current squad.
Click to expand...
Thanks, best post I've read this year, spot on.
People say we have no money so are stuck but I'd say we have the wrong model.
We buy players often past their peak who are not effective in the final third and have no resale value. If we look at other clubs like Forest they run a big transfer surplus cos they buy young up and coming offensive players like Assombalonga then flog them on for 15 million. If we switched to doing this and buying a few up and coming offensive players each year and keep a few of them we could go places without constantly blaming our woes on lack of money. Its not lack of money its poor choices on and off the field and poor strategies, coaching and scouting. .
 
Damski said:
It didn't "go wrong". We had previously been in the 3rd tier for 6 years. Survival was the brief this season, and any of us would have taken 21st place at the start of the season. A top half finish was unthinkable in August.

But we did way better than that. We stormed to the top of the league in our first season back, and only dropped out of the top 6 a few weeks ago. We secured survival around new year, got the biggest win against Them Lot in a generation, stuffed Dirty Leeds twice and generally had some bloody good results, all with a squad which on paper, should be struggling against relegation.

With 5 games to go, we are a few points off top 6, and though I don't think we'll make it, the fact we're even in that situation is a brilliant result. We have overacheived significantly. Yes, it's disappointing that we haven't kept up that superb early season form. But we shouldn't let that take anything away from what Sheffield United has acheived in the last 18 months. It has been nothing short of meteoric. Nothing has gone wrong, and more importantly, a LOT has gone right.
Click to expand...


In the coldlight of day falling away is disappointing but overall we've done alreight.
 
South Bucks said:
Thanks, best post I've read this year, spot on.
People say we have no money so are stuck but I'd say we have the wrong model.
We buy players often past their peak who are not effective in the final third and have no resale value. If we look at other clubs like Forest they run a big transfer surplus cos they buy young up and coming offensive players like Assombalonga then flog them on for 15 million. If we switched to doing this and buying a few up and coming offensive players each year and keep a few of them we could go places without constantly blaming our woes on lack of money. Its not lack of money its poor choices on and off the field and poor strategies, coaching and scouting. .
Click to expand...

Which players have we bought who are past their peak and not effective in the final third?

Unless you’re talking pre-Wilder, in which I would agree
 
SUFC Handsworth said:
I think we took a lot of sides by surprise at the start of the season, I think most teams took us much more seriously a few months in, coupled with Coutts injury, we've got sussed out a bit.

I like that CW wants his team to go for it but that shouldn't be used an excuse when we concede soft goals and at times are poor defensively. We have a captain and vice captain (Clarke gets the armband when Sharp's not on the field) who are both strikers, to me that says a lot about the players behind them. We want a strong, mentally and physically, rock solid imposing leader at the heart of the defence (a Chris Morgan type). That allows Basham and O'Connell more cover if they're bombing forward (I don't think Stearman is that type and Jake Wright is perhaps out of his depth at this level). I'd also like an anchor / leader in midfield too, someone with bite who just sits in there winning their tackles, providing cover in front of the three centre halves (especially with Basham and O'Connell bombing forward), Leonard might be that type of player (in years to come perhaps even Slater). I think our defensive play in the midfield is quite poor and we do struggle to close down in that area in front of the defence.

I'd also question CWs acquisitions in the JTW, did we really need 3 more midfield players to the four already at the club (plus Coutts when he comes back), when we lost one of the centre halves (Carter Vickers).

I don't think we're that far off, we've lost a lot of games by 1 goal, if we'd have tightened up defensively then many of those could have been turned into draws and a few of the draws might have ended up as wins. An imposing leader centre half and defensive midfield player to the current squad and we'd have a better shout for top 6 or even top 2.
Click to expand...

+ a No9.
 
It's a mixture of a lot of things. Not least that there are a lot of decent teams at this level. Some of whom have spunked a lot more money, and are a lot worse off, than us.
 
Bruce Wayne said:
Top in November, smashed pigs, beat Wolves and playing wonderful attacking football. So what happened?

Coutts injury?

Poor Jan transfer window?

Bad luck??

Was in a false position?
Click to expand...

Simon Moore playing 10 consecutive league games from Dec to Feb.
 



zablade said:
Coutts injury started it,

Then...

A loss of nerve for the overlapping centre back tactic after the Fulham home game.

A delusional Transsfer window where we convinced ourselves we had done good business. (We hadn’t )

Clarke dropping off the form of his life.

Donaldson’s legs going.

The manager having a hissy fit after Hull away.

The owners having a punch up.





All a perfect example of how not to close out a promotion challenge.
Click to expand...

That sums it up in a nutshell. The transfer window was a huge disappointment. After Coutts' injury the idea was to hang on in contention until January (which we did) and replace him. Instead we brought in 3 players, one of whom could best be described as barely adequate and the other two who don't feature and were a waste of money. The funds available should have gone on one player who could have done the job.

The second dropped bollock which is going to come back and bite us in the bum big time was the dishing out of new contracts right left and centre to our ageing journeymen. If we had gone up they would have been surplus to requirements. If we stay down, then the team will need refreshing with new and younger faces anyway. So what was the point of that? Now we're lumbered with them for the next two years watching them get older and slower and the money they're on will prevent us from bringing others in. Potential disaster methinks, watch this space.

I'm not saying not getting promotion was a failure, it could better be described as a missed opportunity. That team we had up to December was as good as anyone's in this league and it just needed the right decision making to move it forward. Instead we got served up with a bit of classic SUFC and went in the other direction.
 
LJBlade said:
This is the best post I’ve read on here in quite a while
Click to expand...
Yes it is. In a typically flimsy bladey way.

But back to reality and the now.

We have some very good (and one or two outstanding) Championship standard players. We have dominated sides that are destined for either promotion or the play offs. We have a manager and assistant that deploy a strategy or method that has produced some of the very best football in a generation. We HAVE a good side, one which has Underperformed in recent weeks. NOT overperformed.

The manager fears NO ONE in the division. No one. There is good reason for this. In only 3 or 4 of the 41 games played home and away this year have we genuinely looked 2nd best. We MULLERED Cardiff, sitting pretty in 2nd as recently as this last week.

I do understand the steady progress line that a lot of our fans prefer to take. But even with this in mind, don’t sell yourselves (or your team) short !!!

Big ask, but 2 wins in next two games at home, and let’s check back to gauge your “mood” then !!!!!!!

UTB
 
Although it's not over yet ( Tues ) we have come close this season with one or two shortcomings.Not picking on Boldock but he is a good example of where we are coming up short ! He's been one of our better performers since he came into the side but definitely. flatters to deceive,gets into great position s but wastes most of his good work with a poor ball or decision.
He's a young player who hopefully will get better but a symptom of where we are coming up short.
Not done my homework on this maybe Silent will know ! last few minutes of matches ? how many point winners compared to conceding goals to lose points I think we come up well short there.
We are a team who prides itself on fitness levels , some.thing not right here ? Question for our coaching team (,ChrChris Wilder ? )
 
finlaytheblade said:
Although it's not over yet ( Tues ) we have come close this season with one or two shortcomings.Not picking on Boldock but he is a good example of where we are coming up short ! He's been one of our better performers since he came into the side but definitely. flatters to deceive,gets into great position s but wastes most of his good work with a poor ball or decision.
He's a young player who hopefully will get better but a symptom of where we are coming up short.
Not done my homework on this maybe Silent will know ! last few minutes of matches ? how many point winners compared to conceding goals to lose points I think we come up well short there.
We are a team who prides itself on fitness levels , some.thing not right here ? Question for our coaching team (,ChrChris Wilder ? )
Click to expand...
You pick up on something that has concerned me for a while

If players (human beings after all with physical and emotional limits) are being asked to go full tilt in games, full tilt in training and also given “targets” of fitness to maintain during rest periods, is there an increased risk of burn out ?

UTB
 
of course over the season its fantastic, ill admit i said 14th a cup run & 4pts of Wednesday. would be fantastic season. Which it is but at the moment I can only speak for myself but i hope most critisim come from good place & support. With frustration of seeing missed opportunities, come & go. Because that's 20pts now dropped. It with touching distance but just out of touch. As we should have 7 after out playing cardiff & leading Barnsley. But got 2
 
Nicolaus_Copernicus said:
I respect your opinion EC, but I disagree. It's this kind of attitude that keeps us where we are; I doubt concerns about punching & weight were discussed at swansea, bournemouth, burnley, huddersfield, etc when they were on the way up. Nor are Millwall currently agonising about their over performance. They just get on with it. I agree with what our expectations should've been at season's start, mine were avoid relegation and two dickings by the pigs, but they dramatically altered between August & December and the board should've acted accordingly. Up to and including Coutts injury, it should have been apparent that the fates had conspired to give us a serious chance of promotion this season. Since then, the wheels have slowly fallen off and we are now faced with some uncomfortable questions/home truths going forward. By the look of it we peaked as a club in early December and there now has to be a rapid intervention both on & off the pitch to short the current malaise out. Because as it stands, we're totally out of form, it's relegation form and we are now losing to the crap of the division, 6 of the first 16 are 32 yrs old or over, Coutts might not be firing on all cylinders until 2019, we've gone for quantity over quality in our purchases (some of which are baffling), we have a squad the majority of which has little/no resale value and an ownership issue which appears to be heading for litigation. The result of which appears to be a choice between a kick in the balls or a poke in the eye. An owner without the money to invest or an owner that can't afford to buy the bricks & mortar. There is no brighter day on the horizon, there is no 'go again stronger next season', next season is shaping up to be one of shit & pain. We as a club do not learn, we do not take our opportunities when the are presented and we are now reliant of CW pulling some big fucking rabbits out of a very small hat in close season or squeezing the last remaining pips out of our current squad.
Click to expand...

I love the idea that, at the top of the league, there is just suddenly an extra few million quid found from nowhere to chuck at the team.
 
You could argue that the seeds of this were planted last summer. We never invested in the right players. Therefore, when the momentum began to fizzle out and losing Coutts, we struggled to carry-on in the same way.

We went into the season short upfront but Clarke and Sharp both played out of their skins in patches, so this was plastered over.

We were too light in midfield. Hence bringing in Evans, Leonard and Holmes in the JTW. We placed too much emphasis on Duffy being able to do it every week and Brooks being a wunderkind.

There is no cover at LWB. Stevens performance has dipped off but it's an incredibly physically tiring position and he's played 40+ games without a rest.

Freeman's injury has meant it has been difficult for Baldock at times. Again, in a perfect world he'd be rested more.

People cite the Coutts or Brooks injuries, but we've actually been quite fortunate on that front. Look at the players other team have had out. It could easily have been a lot worse.

At the start of the season they were playing out of their skins. A weak squad meant that tiredness and niggling injuries came in and we've been unable to keep up the tempo/pressing game.

Another huge factor is that other teams have found out how to play against us. Not only sometimes nullifying our system but also exploiting the gaps it leaves at the back.

We've not got a plan B that works anywhere near as well. We've lacked the ability to change tactics t win games.

So, lots of reasons to me. The major one is the investment. We have a number of players at the club not good enough to come into the first team and help out.
 
We got promoted a year ago today, after 6 years in League One.

If you had asked me a year ago what I would have been happy with this season. I would have said 21st and staying up and anything else is a bonus.

In my book being where we aren’t isn’t a failure, things haven’t gone so wrong and this was the season the aim was consolidation and anything else on top has been a nice bonus.

After a cracking start, things have gone our way lately. This is down to a few reasons.

- Sides working out our tactics and working how to counteract them.
- Players running out of steam which is understandable as we’ve given it out all in every game
- Injuries, most pertinently Coutts who orchestrated the team magnificently from the middle of the park

I think a lot of the people who are criticising now, would do well to remember that by any measure we have enjoyed a superb season, enjoyed some great moments and have still got a lot more to be proud of than be critical of.
 
Danny04 said:
I love the idea that, at the top of the league, there is just suddenly an extra few million quid found from nowhere to chuck at the team.
Click to expand...

Owners of clubs & businesses have decisions to make and react to circumstances as appropriate, that's what separates the winners from the losers in life. Opportunities are identified and taken. If ever there was an opportunity to sensibly strengthen than surely being top of the league is it? I'm talking about buying players who were capable of playing at this level this season and for reasons to come. It's not chucking money about, it's investing in the core enterprise of the business to increase the chances of success/promotion. And if promotion is achieved it then gives McCabe a better chance of selling the club for a figure he is happy with. Anyways the issue of players hasn't gone away has it? The need is still there and needs to be addressed. It can be ignored, but it is still there; in the summer, in the next JTW or in the summer of 2019. If there is no money now, they'll be no money in 3 months time and there'll be no money in the next JTW. Why don't the club be honest and say, we have a budget that is geared towards survival in the championship no more? Or are we continuing on our well worn path of jam tomorrow, europe in 5 years at BDTBL?

I have never asked for anything which hasn't been promised, discussed in an open forum or should reasonably be expected of a club of our size. I sat in a meeting with McCabe in August when he said that funds would be available in January to push for promotion or fight off relegation. This was at the same time as we couldn't afford to buy Devante Cole but Wigan could. There is also an interview with Alan Biggs and Tareq Hawasli saying that money was available in October. As it turns out we ended up borrowing a couple of million at the last moment from a bank to fund four purchases (3 perms & a loan), two of which will probably leave in the summer for less than we paid for them and had to send CCV back to Spurs to balance the books. I also thought we bid £4m for Conor Coady in August, or did I imagine that (you'll be able to confirm)?
 
Damski said:
It didn't "go wrong". We had previously been in the 3rd tier for 6 years. Survival was the brief this season, and any of us would have taken 21st place at the start of the season. A top half finish was unthinkable in August.

But we did way better than that. We stormed to the top of the league in our first season back, and only dropped out of the top 6 a few weeks ago. We secured survival around new year, got the biggest win against Them Lot in a generation, stuffed Dirty Leeds twice and generally had some bloody good results, all with a squad which on paper, should be struggling against relegation.

With 5 games to go, we are a few points off top 6, and though I don't think we'll make it, the fact we're even in that situation is a brilliant result. We have overacheived significantly. Yes, it's disappointing that we haven't kept up that superb early season form. But we shouldn't let that take anything away from what Sheffield United has acheived in the last 18 months. It has been nothing short of meteoric. Nothing has gone wrong, and more importantly, a LOT has gone right.
Click to expand...
Well said Sir!

It’s really about raised expectations. If the season had started poor to average but we’d ended up on 62 points with 5 games to play, this team would be hailed as heroes.
 



Bruce Wayne said:
I hate that term 'punching above our weight' we are Sheffield United not fucking Burton. We (and the board) need to realise this.
Click to expand...

My comment about punching above or weight was not about the size of Clubs but more about the quality of players we have at the moment.
How many of our current squad would other championship sides really be interested in if we had gone back down maybe 4 max.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

JayGreen17
What is Wrong With Wilder?
6 7 8
Replies
225
Views
14K
luffenhamblade
L
BazWainwright
So glad ...
2
Replies
42
Views
3K
dn5 shaun
dn5 shaun
Kozzy_is_my_Dad
Where has it started to go wrong?
Replies
27
Views
3K
Tom Bott
Tom Bott
INTERUNITED
Overlapping centre backs - the worst thing to happen to Wilder
2
Replies
46
Views
3K
Blademan89
Blademan89
ShorehamRevolution
What ever happened to….
Replies
24
Views
1K
Old Programme seller
Old Programme seller

All advertisments are hidden for logged in members, why not log in/register?

All advertisments are hidden for logged in members, why not log in/register?

Back
Top Bottom