Why Did Sheff United Go Down?

[Heely bottoms underpants]

I agree with your point in not seeing certain players down at the Lane. However, we couldn’t have got promoted at a better time in terms of when Covid hit for financial reasons. If we was in the Championship with little income, we would be in a right mess now.

That's very true mate...
UTB

 

[ATL Recs]

2 KEY things for me.

1. Intensity dropped off a Cliff. We just didn’t move the ball quickly enough, exacerbated by poor off the ball movement to create any sort of space for others.

2. Passing accuracy fell well short of last few seasons. Linked to above as, to a man, there was less time on the ball.

I HAVE to question the full tilt in training ethos adopted for such a long time. The players looked knackered half the time. It must have taken its toll in the final analysis.

UTB

That’s Five keys things not two

 

[DronnieBlade]

That’s Five keys things not two

If you say so.

UTB

 

[BrianBadonde]

Because we were absolute wank

 

[Bladesman]

With all disasters it’s never usually down to one thing but a domino effect of incidents and wrong decisions being made. (If anyone watches air crash investigation will know what I mean)

- COVID restrictions. Leading to lack of team bonding sessions away from the club in pre season etc. Wilder not able to blow off steam personally with his mates as well. I said at the time of the outbreak this would have a massive impact on us as a club.

- Board issues. Wilder’s rather minor disagreements with the board he dwelled on too much I think due to the above. Wilder didn’t seem to appreciate the impact the pandemic was and is having on the club and that his ambitious plans for the club may need to be put on hold for a bit.

- Drop in funds. Although we pissed away a fair sum in the summer. We did have deals in place to sign the likes of Retsos permanently which were cancelled due to this. It clearly caused some disruption to the plans Wilder had for the squad.

- Wilders breakdown. The Chris Wilder who left was not the man who arrived. Whatever went off personally and professionally clearly impacted his mental health. You can see the change in his Leicester away post match interview last season onwards. It seemed like a breaking point for Wilder that interview and as others thought at the time that interview would upset the dressing room too.

- Zero fans. I believe we may have been in a relegation fight this season but with fans Wilder would still be here and we would have put up a much better fight.

- Lundstram contract saga. Treating him differently to Duffy. I’d not be surprised if that caused unrest in the dressing room. It should have been nipped in the bud at the end of last season and a new midfielder brought in.

- O’Connell injury. A complete failure from management and medical staff at the club to not recognise he was seriously injured long before this season started. I’m angry at the bullshit from Wilder and the club about this, you could clearly see he wasn’t right during the restart. If we the fans can see it then it on the pitch, it boggles the mind the manager and the club can’t.

Secondary issues: New signings not bedding in and short term injuries to other key players. I believe although these things had an impact, these are things we would overcome in a normal season. As Hal points out we had periods in the Championship with players missing injured for big matches and new signings struggling to settle. Wilder adjusted and adapted back then but didn’t this season, why?

 

[Champagneblade]

Ask yourself if Harry Bassett would have tolerated John Lundstram for longer than it took to knock him flat out in the dressing room

What was just as off with that is that we didn't use up our loans.

So at reasonable cost, we could have loaned one domestic based Midfielder or one foreigner. Why did we fail to use this up in September?

Bladesman also raising a good point on COVID. The financial impact seemed to just pass Chris by.

When he was moaning about the training ground or about a lack of activity in January (though we later learned that twice trying to bin it rightly in my view, had an impact on this) I did want someone to just say "err, Chris have you seen the news lately at all?"

We had no outside revenue and broadcast money was down. We still spent 50-60m in fees. Something had to give when we got a 20m hole they probably extended further.

Not adding the odd training pitch was a small sacrifice to pay.

Alternatively the Board were entitled to say "if you wanted an upgrade on facilities right away, perhaps you could have not pissed away 23m on Brewster?"

 

[Bladesman]

What was just as off with that is that we didn't use up our loans.

So at reasonable cost, we could have loaned one domestic based Midfielder or one foreigner. Why did we fail to use this up in September?

Another thing to the list of poor decisions.

 

[nopigfansintown]

Many reasons. The key ones.

1) Disrupted calendar fucked up United's world class pre season regime. Our plan A was world class our adaptation to these unique circumstances - far from it. One of our levellers gone before a ball is kicked.

2) Injuries to key personal. Pivotal: our world class system fucked over by injuries and the failure to bring in adequate replacements. Our second big leveller gone.

3) The inability to come up with an adequate plan B. Possibly impossible with the players at our disposal.

4) Signings too focused on youth prospects rather than experienced competition for current players. Whether this was feasible/realistic looking at the previous 4-5 years is an argument for another time.

 

[Tezza1889]

YorkBlade

Think this is the first one I've watched, very good work here.
Will be watching more... Cheers

 

[PurpleRain]

From a more distant view for me it’s the summer recruitment. As a promoted side the 2nd season is always the most difficult and you need to sign 3, 4 players that give a quality boost. You guys spend 50 mio or so on players that did not provide any quality boost. That’s just crazy and you cannot expect to stay up with that kind of recruitment. Other factors like injuries and no tactical flexibility etc. have also contributed but summer recruitment was the nr 1 reason for the horror season.

 

[Bearlie]

Thank you. That's very kind.

I agree , you would do well on tv buddy

 

[Tezza1889]

I still think, some quality in the middle (a "proper" ball player to work with the grafters) and a few decent defence splitting balls to the forwards we'd have been OK.... We'd have stopped up, just.

Stubbornness with the formation was the problem, it wasn't working, manager had given up early on it seems..

 

[YorkBlade]

YorkBlade

Think this is the first one I've watched, very good work here.
Will be watching more... Cheers

Thank you. That's made my day and really does mean a lot to me.

If you'd consider subscribing (it's free) that would really help the channel grow. I put a tremendous amount of work into every video. There's lots on there you may enjoy already.

 

[Tezza1889]

Thank you. That's made my day and really does mean a lot to me.

If you'd consider subscribing (it's free) that would really help the channel grow. I put a tremendous amount of work into every video. There's lots on there you may enjoy already.

Yeah i'll sign into YT and sub the channel..

 

[Chilttheblade]

Because Wilder was a lucky bastard and when the luck ran out it was clear managing in the Premier League was way over his capabilities.

 

[Headshrinker]

I will point to small margins. The start wasn't as bad as the points tally.

Some tough decisions, bad luck and undeserving losses destroyed the season right away and there was no rebounding from that, as things spiralled downwards.

It could have been a lot different had a few of the early decisions gone the other way with a couple different results.

 

[Bladesman]

Because Wilder was a lucky bastard and when the luck ran out it was clear managing in the Premier League was way over his capabilities.

There was nothing lucky about our promotion to the PL. We were unlucky the season before that Coutts got injured as I reckon we may have sneaked into top 6 of the Championship.

 

[BladeTillIDie]

Covid
No fans to motivate players
JOC injury
Very poor recruitment
Playing players who don't want to be here
Stubbornness

 

[Tony_Kaufman]

Casting aside the other numerous and myriad reasons we were relegated, one of the big ones for me is that we were victims of the Premier League's selfishness and arrogance.

When we were promoted we reportedly had the fourth lowest wage bill in the Championship, so without a shadow of a doubt we had the lowest wage bill in the Premier League by a country mile.

We were promoted with little to no debt, we spent within our means, not risking the long term future of the club and we finished 9th, and without lockdown we were selling out the Lane each week with crowd capacity being in the top ten in the division (I may be mistaken).

So for the second season we had loads to spend in the summer for staying up right? Wrong. We again spent only what we had, or what we would receive by the end of the season. We'd spent a lot of our first seasons revenue in the previous summer on recruitment and now the Prince had to reserve some of the following seasons money to pay off McCabe.

Essentially once more we were penniless by Premier League standards.

Unfortunately to survive in the Premier League you need a very rich billionaire owner willing to pump money at will into the club. We ran our club on money we had, money we earned and without putting ourselves into debt or at risk long term. Unfortunately you can't do this in the Premier League.

The Premier League doesn't care that clubs are running themselves on sugar daddy donations and FFP doesn't seem to apply. The Premier League is too high on the smell of it's own farts to care or see it as a bad model and continues to encourage it.

Why were we relegated? Because we run our club financially responsibly and only spend what we have? How many other Premier League can say the same and where would they be if they did.

I've said it loads over the last two decades. The best thing to happen to English football was the ITV Digital collapse. The worse thing to happen to English football was the arrival of Roman Abramovich.

The Premier League is a broken league and no one cares and it's past the point of fixing it because there are too many loopholes to let clubs do what they want.

If they ban rich owners from pumping millions into clubs they'll just do dodgy sponsorship deals to get round it. Owner invests £100mil into a company. The company then sponsors the club £100mil for the season. Any rules broken? No.

 

[PurpleRain]

Casting aside the other numerous and myriad reasons we were relegated, one of the big ones for me is that we were victims of the Premier League's selfishness and arrogance.

When we were promoted we reportedly had the fourth lowest wage bill in the Championship, so without a shadow of a doubt we had the lowest wage bill in the Premier League by a country mile.

We were promoted with little to no debt, we spent within our means, not risking the long term future of the club and we finished 9th, and without lockdown we were selling out the Lane each week with crowd capacity being in the top ten in the division (I may be mistaken).

So for the second season we had loads to spend in the summer for staying up right? Wrong. We again spent only what we had, or what we would receive by the end of the season. We'd spent a lot of our first seasons revenue in the previous summer on recruitment and now the Prince had to reserve some of the following seasons money to pay off McCabe.

Essentially once more we were penniless by Premier League standards.

Unfortunately to survive in the Premier League you need a very rich billionaire owner willing to pump money at will into the club. We ran our club on money we had, money we earned and without putting ourselves into debt or at risk long term. Unfortunately you can't do this in the Premier League.

The Premier League doesn't care that clubs are running themselves on sugar daddy donations and FFP doesn't seem to apply. The Premier League is too high on the smell of it's own farts to care or see it as a bad model and continues to encourage it.

Why were we relegated? Because we run our club financially responsibly and only spend what we have? How many other Premier League can say the same and where would they be if they did.

I've said it loads over the last two decades. The best thing to happen to English football was the ITV Digital collapse. The worse thing to happen to English football was the arrival of Roman Abramovich.

The Premier League is a broken league and no one cares and it's past the point of fixing it because there are too many loopholes to let clubs do what they want.

If they ban rich owners from pumping millions into clubs they'll just do dodgy sponsorship deals to get round it. Owner invests £100mil into a company. The company then sponsors the club £100mil for the season. Any rules broken? No.

But was the money you had spend wisely? 50mio on a young goalie, an unproven striker and some back-up players. With 50 mio a mid table team in la Liga, serie a or French Ligue 1 buys better players I think. I am not talking about the top 4 teams in those leagues but the teams between 6 and 12 position buy 4, 5 really good players with a budget of 50 mio. So something is wrong.

 

[bromtom]

But was the money you had spend wisely? 50mio on a young goalie, an unproven striker and some back-up players. With 50 mio a mid table team in la Liga, serie a or French Ligue 1 buys better players I think. I am not talking about the top 4 teams in those leagues but the teams between 6 and 12 position buy 4, 5 really good players with a budget of 50 mio. So something is wrong.

It wasn't wisely spent no, I think if we'd bought Ramsdale, a £10m LCB of quality to actually cover/replace JOC and a £5-10m RM midfielder we'd have done better and saved money.

Everyone we bought except for Ramsdale and Bogle to some degree, didn't help.

A mix of getting ahead of ourselves buying for 2022/23 and beyond and panicking when it was too late to get value.

 

[Revolution]

Covid
More injuries
Terrible transfer business
Poor tactical choices
The complete collapse in form of half a dozen of our regulars
An inevitable regression to the mean of some things that went really well in 2020

 

[blade67]

I think we have had one of those seasons where too many issues built up.

The left side was weakened from day 1 with JoC out, Fleck in and out with injury and Stevens off form.

That put greater pressure on the less able right side, and they couldn't step up.

The reduced effectiveness of those two groups exposed Ollie Norwood weaknesses

and the GK having a troubled start all added up to our shocking start.

From there, confidence was low and the lack of a home crowd reduced our ability to win the odd point from one of those games we've all been to at the lane where a bunch of fryers get a confidence boost from a Partizan crowd.

As a result we were done by Christmas (2 points? At that stage)

Libby then decided to go in gardening leave and we suffered one of those injury crises that only happen to sides at the bottom

The strikers were all shit (didzy aside), but get a bit of a pass from me based on the shitshiw taking place behind them

 

[cahill]

Is it because we were shit ?

 

[Come from away]

I think we have had one of those seasons where too many issues built up.

The left side was weakened from day 1 with JoC out, Fleck in and out with injury and Stevens off form.

That put greater pressure on the less able right side, and they couldn't step up.

The reduced effectiveness of those two groups exposed Ollie Norwood weaknesses

and the GK having a troubled start all added up to our shocking start.

From there, confidence was low and the lack of a home crowd reduced our ability to win the odd point from one of those games we've all been to at the lane where a bunch of fryers get a confidence boost from a Partizan crowd.

As a result we were done by Christmas (2 points? At that stage)

Libby then decided to go in gardening leave and we suffered one of those injury crises that only happen to sides at the bottom

The strikers were all shit (didzy aside), but get a bit of a pass from me based on the shitshiw taking place behind them

I think you have much of the core reason for our failure. Thanks .

 

[Trigger Blade]

Nice video Hal. You have a great Broadcasters voice.

I’m very sensitive to vocal ticks and you don’t have any that I noticed along with a very natural and fluid presentation style.

Just one thing, can you do Bohemian Rhapsody to your own keyboard accompaniment?

It’s just that Benjamin Bloom can, it’s always good to have more than one strung to your bow

 

[sitwell]

Covid. we had the momentum we were going to Newcastle looking for a European place ,they had no keeper ,we would have moved on. Instead we had an enforced break at the worst time possible and come back to a sterile game which is unrecognisable as football. The domino effect then kicked in ,lack of form ,injuries lack of momentum leading to defeats , lack of pre season ,lack of fitness and the spiral continued.

However , we woz shit ,we were wank ,coz were crap suits some minds

Great effort btw YorkBlade very watchable and accurate.

 

[CopenhagenBlade]

The luck of the fixture list had an effect. I think Wilder looked at that and thought, ‘apart from the Fulham game we’re looking at damage limitation’. We played not to lose heavily in the first 7 games and then never got going after that and the style was set.
Plus all the other reasons, like JOC, fans, Lunny, stubbornness.....

 

[Blade.com]

I agree , you would do well on tv buddy

Too good for TV. There are lots of bloggers? (not sure if that's the right word). On You Tube who do a lot better analysis than the so called pundits on TV. Enjoyed it. Good work.

 

[Keen Blade]

With all disasters it’s never usually down to one thing but a domino effect of incidents and wrong decisions being made. (If anyone watches air crash investigation will know what I mean)

- COVID restrictions. Leading to lack of team bonding sessions away from the club in pre season etc. Wilder not able to blow off steam personally with his mates as well. I said at the time of the outbreak this would have a massive impact on us as a club.

- Board issues. Wilder’s rather minor disagreements with the board he dwelled on too much I think due to the above. Wilder didn’t seem to appreciate the impact the pandemic was and is having on the club and that his ambitious plans for the club may need to be put on hold for a bit.

- Drop in funds. Although we pissed away a fair sum in the summer. We did have deals in place to sign the likes of Retsos permanently which were cancelled due to this. It clearly caused some disruption to the plans Wilder had for the squad.

- Wilders breakdown. The Chris Wilder who left was not the man who arrived. Whatever went off personally and professionally clearly impacted his mental health. You can see the change in his Leicester away post match interview last season onwards. It seemed like a breaking point for Wilder that interview and as others thought at the time that interview would upset the dressing room too.

- Zero fans. I believe we may have been in a relegation fight this season but with fans Wilder would still be here and we would have put up a much better fight.

- Lundstram contract saga. Treating him differently to Duffy. I’d not be surprised if that caused unrest in the dressing room. It should have been nipped in the bud at the end of last season and a new midfielder brought in.

- O’Connell injury. A complete failure from management and medical staff at the club to not recognise he was seriously injured long before this season started. I’m angry at the bullshit from Wilder and the club about this, you could clearly see he wasn’t right during the restart. If we the fans can see it then it on the pitch, it boggles the mind the manager and the club can’t.

Secondary issues: New signings not bedding in and short term injuries to other key players. I believe although these things had an impact, these are things we would overcome in a normal season. As Hal points out we had periods in the Championship with players missing injured for big matches and new signings struggling to settle. Wilder adjusted and adapted back then but didn’t this season, why?

Spot on