Blades defiant stand

Monday, 28/02/2011

by Sean Dungworth, Shoot's Sheffield United blogger

The twilight of the season is upon us, and just like the sickening, **** end to a bull fight, United, the once mighty beast, stands forlorn, defiant, but ultimately dying from a thousand cuts.

This then presents us with a problem. Do we want a swift in March, leaving the club to play freely and without fear until the season close? Allow some of the academy players who have been knocking on the first team door to have a run out with the ‘big boys’. And, crucially let the manager plan for a promotion from League One.

Alternatively, do we want to go down fighting tooth and nail, battling the odds and the inevitable, only to die a lingering, painful Championship death?

I genuinely believe that we are to be relegated, especially after the result against Derby on Saturday, of that I am sure. Only the manner of our demise is yet to be decided.

The only light to illuminate our darkness, at present, is the impending return of Darius Henderson. This hope in itself it shrouded with hypocrisy.

When injured prior to the season starting, many, many United fans received the news with glee, especially given that the recovery time was expected to be lengthy. The reason being that Henderson’s aerial strength was blamed for Blackwell’s uninspiring ‘hoof-ball’ tactics.

That was, of course, when we hoped Ched Evans would blossom into the goal scoring machine we expected. It was before we discovered Jamie Ward had cheese-strings for hamstrings. Before Billy Sharp made his move to Rovers permanent. Before an ageing Cresswell suddenly found himself, curiously, playing on the wing where his lack of pace and endurance would find him lacking, and we found out that Bogdanovic was an impact player from the bench.

So, the fans that were glad to see the back of Mr Henderson are now champing at the bit at the prospect of his return… and WE say footballers are too fickle!

Due to Adams’ tactics of trying to ‘get the ball forward quickly’ Henderson may well fit in and be the spark we need to kick start our survival battle. I fear, however, the addition of; possibly, some Henderson goals may well be too late. In addition to that, can Henderson keep pace with the amount of goals we are conceding?

Our back four have been appalling this term, there is no other word for it, well, not one that can appear in print at any rate. Regardless of the manager, of their style, our defenders have worked hard, but have had the attention span of someone with ADHD living on a diet of blue Smarties! Their lapses have cost us dearly, and the absence of Chris Morgan has been lamentable.

In fact, lamentable is a word that could be applied to every aspect of our clubs’ performance this season, from the chairman/owner downwards.

Nevertheless, although I am not an aficionado of the ‘sport’ of bull fighting, one thing I do know, now and again, very, very occasionally… the bull wins!

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