Blades rise to the challenge

Wednesday, 15/02/2012

by Tom Seymour, Shoot's Sheffield United blogger

The Blades pulled off a vital away win last night against promotion rivals Huddersfield Town and jumped back up to second spot.

Centre-back Neill Collins popped up in the fifth minute to head in his first goal for the club, in a 0-1 victory.

It wasn’t all United’s way though, as League One top scorer Jordan Rhodes hit the post with a volley, just before half-time. In the second half the ball was cleared off the line, by captain Michael Doyle, from a Sean Morrison header.

United held on until the end though, inflicting only the third defeat of the season upon the Terriers. It puts them two points ahead of fierce local rivals Wednesday, as well as having two games in hand.

It signalled the last game in charge for Huddersfield manager Lee Clark, as he was sacked today. It was a sorry end to the manager’s three years at the club, in which he led them to a play-off final and achieved a football league record of 43 league matches unbeaten.

It’s been a fairly impressive debut season at Sheffield United however, for manager Danny Wilson, who didn’t have the backing of all the Bramall Lane faithful when he started (myself included). Being an ex-Wednesday boss didn’t help his cause, but he’s mostly proved his critics wrong with solid, if not outstanding, performances.

But whilst consistently beating the teams at the lower end of the table, United were finding victories over the sides around them difficult to come by. The three points last night will have done wonders for the confidence at the club and needless to say, their league position.

This coupled with defeats to sides challenging promotion – MK Dons lost to Charlton and Wednesday slipped up at home to Stevenage - the win offers an opportunity for the Blades to create a gap.

United are at home for three of their next four league games and face the prospect of a trip to Hillsborough in two weekend’s time. They could realistically take 10 points from these fixtures and start to move away from the play-off zone and towards leaders Charlton – who are currently eight points ahead.

Sheffield United’s trouble since being relegated from the Premier League in 2007 has been consistency; particularly at home. So far this season hasn’t confounded those doubts fully and the team will have to be careful not to throw away points in the coming fixtures, after achieving such a sterling job last night.

One game doesn’t make a season, but it is certainly a positive sign in the red half of the city.

They also have a good Championship, let alone League One, striker in Ched Evans, coming back into form and a relatively young side who are beginning to show real potential as a unit. The challenge is still the same though – automatic promotion.

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