After the slight resurgence of form that we experienced in January, United went into February knowing that there would be some crunch clashes coming up against teams around them that we had to win if we still wanted to stay in the Premier League come the end of the season. Would the month of love end in joy or heartbreak? I mean, you already know what happens, but I just thought I'd add a little bit of suspense, no? Okie dokie, let's review February.
A Brief(ish) Review Of The Month A big game straight out of the blocks for The Blades in February with the visit of West Brom to The Lane in a match that could have gone a long way in deciding who finished where come the final league games. Miraculously, United would actually be the ones to win this bottom of the table rumble in the suburban jungle with goals from Jayden Bogle and Billy Sharp (who else?) Cancelling out Matt Phillips first half effort to give United a positive start to the month and actually see us win our 3rd game out of the last 5. It was back to business as usual however in the next game with Chelsea edging us out at home with Mason Mount opening the scoring and despite United equalising via one of the best own goals I've ever seen from Antonio Rudiger, it was cancelled out literally two minutes later when Jorginho got the winner from the spot for Thomas Tuchel's men. Our FA Cup campaign resumed in the next game with another familiar team visiting our home in Bristol City. Despite being something of a bogey team for us over the past couple of years (Andreas Weimann still gives me nightmares everytime I see the colour purple) we manged to dispatch the Championship side pretty easily with the 1-0 score line being pretty kind to the visitors. It did take a while to score our winner however with the goal eventually coming from a sharp penalty after Alfie Mawson was sent off for deliberate handball after he punched a Lundstram effort off the line. The day after Valentine's saw us travel back to the capital and the London Stadium where a resurgent West Ham side duly cut us to pieces with a commanding 3-0 win with Declan Rice, Diop and Fredericks getting the goals for the Hammers. We stayed in London but went from the bright lights of the London Stadium to the homely surroundings of Craven Cottage the home of Fulham and in this bottom of the table crunch match it would be those Cottagers who would secure a vital three points and probably put the first nail in our relegation coffin. Ademola Lookman repeated what he did at Bramall Lane and got Fulham's goal that saw them get the win despite late United shouts for what looked like a nailed on penalty when Areola unceremoniously chopped down Bogle late on after a scramble from a corner. Another tough month for United ended with another tough result with the defending champions Liverpool coming and getting a 2-0 win despite Aaron Ramsdale's best efforts to keep them out. second half goals from Curtis Jones and Roberto Firmino curtailed a month that started brightly for United but ended so very poorly. Player Of The Month: Billy Sharp We began to see the Rammers provide some of his late season brilliance this month with his point blank save against West Brom and especially his first half performance against Liverpool almost getting him the award (we'll see him get some POTM awards soon) but this month I think the award has to go to the skipper thanks to his continued ability to pop up and get a crucial goal when you need it. Despite taking a much reduced role over the course of our time in the Premier League, Billy has still proven the banner that sits proudly on The Kop correct that he does infact, score goals. He produced 5 goals this season which is fairly impressive when you consider he only made 19 appearances over the course of the season. The reduced game time has not seen his influence diminish on the club however and especially after Wilder left, Billy is now more than ever the voice of the fans within the squad itself. He's been a fantastic servant to the club and it's good that in this final chapter of his career that he's finally scoring goals for his boyhood club. We'll probably not see a player like Billy at the club for a while once he's gone so let's cherish him whilst we have him and let's hope that there'll be more goals in him to come. Goal Of The Month: Jayden Bogle VS West Brom, 2nd February 2021 There was genuine temptation to put Antonio Rudiger's own goal here for GOTM because it was an absolutely sensational own goal. But, I feel like you've got to try and give it to a player who actually plays for the club and, on reflection, the Rudiger goal might not be as good as I remember but this goal from Jayden Bogle was really good. The ex Derby man worked his way into the penalty area and after holding off the attentions of a West Brom defender, managed to make some space, turn and smash home a rocket of a shot that I think even 5 Sam Johnstone's would have struggled to save.
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New year, new United? Maybe, I mean, we actually won some competitive games in the new year which was a nice change to things but of course, we started with a loss. So, let's get on with it.
A Brief(ish) Review Of The Month On the second day of the brand new year, United travelled to London and Selhurst Park where we continued to be consistent in the worst way and lose 2-0 to two first half goals from Crystal Palace with Eberechi Eze scoring the pick of the goals with a dancing run through our backline before placing the ball past Rammers. The monotony of the league campaign was broken up with a visit to old League 1 rivals Bristol Rovers and, after 6 months without a competitive win, United pulled off a hard fought victory against The Gas. United opened the scoring through a deflected Lys Mousset header that harshly went down as an own goal. Rovers didn't roll over however and got an equaliser 15 minutes later via a header from a well placed free kick. That was the end of the scoring in the first half but just before the hour mark Oli Burke used his blazing pace to put himself through on goal where he duly bagged to open his goalscoring account for United. Bristol again came back and just 3 minutes later they were back in it with a close range finish from Ehmer. The drama didn't stop there and to top off a crazy 4 minutes Jayden Bogle finished off a lovely team move to score our third and the last goal of the game so, we've won a game of football! And, more importantly, we were through to the 4th round of the FA Cup. Following up on the success against Rovers, we won our first league game of the season 3 days later with 10 man Newcastle eventually succumbing to Blades pressure by giving away a penalty that Billy Sharp duly dispatched to give us a vital 3 points and give Billy his 100th goal in a United shirt. It was back to normal however in the next game against Tottenham with Spurs running away with a 3-1 win with Ndombele scoring an outrageous effort shortly after McGoldrick put a header past Lloris to give us a chance to get something. It was back to Cup action next with Plymouth visiting The Lane and United booked their place in the 5th Round with a commanding(ish) performance against The Pilgrims with a Basham header and a Sharp finish being just enough to see off the visitors. Up next however, is arguably one of our best wins in our short stint in the Prem where we went to Old Trafford and beat the mighty Manchester United 2-1. Kean Bryan (yes, really) opened the scoring with a header from a corner but despite some impressive rear guard action, mainly marshalled by the outstanding Phil Jagielka, Harry Maguire equalised for Man United with his own header from a corner. But, instead of sitting back and defending like we'd done so many times before this season, we actually went on the offensive and only bloody scored! Oli Burke (yes, really) sent a deflected effort that hoodwinked De Gea and gave us a most unlikely second win of the season. We ended the month still in Manchester with a visit to the soon to be crowned champions. United put up another good performance that was only undone by a poor bit of early defending that allowed Ferran Torres to get up off his arse and score a goal. Flecky nearly got a goal late on but it wasn't to be. But at least we won some games. Player Of The Month: Chris Basham I was thinking of giving the award this month to Jags after his standout performance against Man United but unfortunately that was only one game. So, I'll give it to the other United stalwart in the team in Chris Basham who also played a crucial part in that backline that night. At times, it really has just been Bash who has been the attacking threat for United this season with him being the only one of our once fabled overlapping centre backs who actually still tried to overlap. His dribbling was still bamboozling top quality defenders but unlike last season, he just didn't have anyone to lay the ball off to when he finished his darts forward. So congrats on the award Bash, it's the least you deserve. Goal Of The Month: Jayden Bogle VS Bristol Rovers, 9th January 2021 Remember when we were a well oiled attacking team last season? I'm thinking the goals against Villa at home, Burnley at home, you know the one's. Well, we didn't do that as much this season but we did do it at least once. This goal that Jayden Bogle started and managed to finish brought a real reminder that these players that hadn't won a competitive game for half a year still did have some of the quality that led us to finishing 9th in the Prem last season despite what they were showing week in, week out. It was a free flowing, fast moving manoeuvre that eventually saw Jayden slotting home to ultimately give us our first win of the season. At the start of 2020, we were 5th in the Premier League and knocking on the door of securing European football for the first time in the history of our football club. So it was a bit of a bummer that we ended this year being bottom of the Premier League with only 2 points to our name after 16 games, I think it's safe to say that it's definitely up there with in extreme year bookends. So, 6 games to review, let's get on with them.
A Brief(ish) Review Of The Month Another start to the month and yet another loss with Leicester coming to The Lane and securing a late, late winner thanks to that man again Jamie Vardy. Ayoze Perez (another player who likes to score against The Blades) opened the scoring but two minutes later, Oli McBurnie equalised and it looked like United would hang on to get our second point of the season. Alas, we didn't count on the man fuelled by Skittles Vodka with the ex-Stocksbridge Park Steel's man latching onto a late through ball and breaking United hearts and our corner flag. After that we were on the south coast where we played our first game of the season in front of fans at Southampton where we proceeded to produce a performance best described as like watching someone projectile vomit repeatedly for an hour and a half. Adams, Armstrong and Redmond got the goals and that's all I want to say about that game. Next up was a visit of one of the big boys to Bramall Lane with Manchester United coming to town in our last home game since Christmas. Manchester United gave us an early Christmas present early doors with ex-Blades Maguire and Henderson combining to gift David McGoldrick a tap in to give us the lead. Then Sander Berge got injured and we put Jags on instead of a midfielder and not long after that the veteran defender was exposed by a ball over the top and Rashford converted to equal the scores. Martial bagged a second not long after that and then shortly after half time, Rashford got his second that looked like it killed the game. However, McGoldrick managed to get his head on a corner late on in the game to reduce the deficit and a late Lys Mousset effort looked like it would give us an unlikely equaliser but Henderson pulled off a wonderful save and an entertaining game ended with another loss for United. Our actual last match before Christmas was a visit to Brighton where we actually managed to get our second point at the season that arguably should have been three. John Lundstram was sent off in the first half but United were resolute and actually opened the scoring thanks to debutant Jayden Bogle. It looked like we'd finally have our first three points of the season but then Danny Welbeck ruined it all with a late equaliser. We ended the month with back to back 1-0 losses against Burnley and Everton to finish the year on the lowest of lows. Player Of The Month: George Baldock I don't really remember a lot of the individual performances from December but I think I'll give it to George this month plus, he signed a new contract around this time until 2024 so that's brilliant news. George is a player that wears his heart on his sleeve and you can definitely tell that Billy wasn't lying when he said that George was the player that's most bought into Sheffield United since he came into the club. He always gives 100% commitment for United and his performances this season have been good when a lot of the other players have been very poor. He's surely a future captain for United and could potentially be the next Chris Basham. Nothing else left to say really other than we all like George. George is cool. Goal Of The Month: Jayden Bogle VS Brighton, Sunday 20th December 2020 We actually scored 4 goals this month, which is almost enough for a GOTM competition but I think the pick of the goals this month is Bogez debut goal in the away draw against Brighton. After not even being on the bench for a large part of the first half of the season, Bogle was brought on the bench due to injuries and when he got on in the second half he looked very lively and scored a lovely goal that showed brilliant composure and a cool head for a player that was making his top flight debut and at just 19. It was a well taken goal that took a bit of a deflection but was still great to watch. A first real sign that Bogez could be an important player for us going forward. It's a really good thing that we only played three games in November because this was a rough month looking back on it. Although it arguably had our best performance of the season so far that, you guessed it, we still lost in. Let's start the review.
A Brief(ish) Review Of The Month Before Hakim Ziyech went and torched us, United actually started the game against Chelsea really well and went ahead with an extremely well worked goal that ended with David McGoldrick backheeling past Mendy to give us the lead. Then we conceded 4 goals (including a header to Thiago Silva) and our bad form continued. The media's favourite 'rivalry' game was up next with the visit of West Ham to The Lane and in a game where not much happened, Sebastian Haller hit a thunderbolt of a shot past Ramsdale from about 25 yards that turned out to be the winner. We ended the month with one of the most one sided losses I think I've ever seen with United going to West Brom and creating, at a best estimate, 700 chances to score and converting none of them as we tried to overturn Conor Gallagher's early strike. It was perhaps the first real omen that this season might not end well but in my everlasting optimism, I thought it was a positive that we'd start to create more chances in games and actually score. How wrong was I. Player Of The Month: David McGoldrick The end of the Berge grip on this 'prestigious' award with our Dave taking it off him for November. Despite almost everyone else in the squad being absolute tosh for this month and the whole of the season, David McGoldrick has been a shining light of creativity and positivity in a season that has had few of both. His cultured finish against Chelsea proves that he really should have been playing at the top flight level longer than the two seasons that he has with us. It's a real pleasure that he has played his top flight football with us though because he's absolute class. Goal Of The Month: David McGoldrick VS Chelsea, Saturday 7th November 2020 It's the only goal we scored of the month but much like September's goal, it was really well worked and worth another watch. Good work from a set piece eventually saw Oli Norwood put in perhaps his best cross of the season that eventually found it's way to McGoldrick who flicked the ball past Mendy with his heel to give us the lead and end Mendy's run of clean sheets. We got our first point this month! Yay! Will it lead to us kicking on and finally climbing the league table? No, because then we went and lost our next match after that. So here's October, enjoy!
A Brief(ish) Review Of The Month United started the month as they ended the last month with a loss. This time it was away in London after a visit to the Emirates the home of Arsenal. After Luiz probably should have been sent off after pulling back Oli Burke when he was clear through on goal, Arsenal scored twice but United did pull a goal back late on with McGoldrick curling home from 20 yards to reduce the deficit. It was back to The Lane after this and this is where we secured our first point of the season. Lookman opened the scoring for Fulham and it looked like it would be another loss for United when Robinson gave away a penalty late on. Mitrovic missed the penalty then gave away a penalty a few minutes later. None other than Billy Sharp hammered home to rescue the day for United and get us up and running. The home of the defending champions was up next and United produced one of the performances of the season against Liverpool with Sander Berge netting a penalty early doors that was cancelled out just before half time thanks to Firmino. United arguably should have had another penalty later in the game but despite the good performance, Liverpool scored a second thanks to Jota and it was another loss for the Blades. Back at The Lane and the visit of Pep Guardiola's Man City who were largely dominant and got their goal thanks to former Blade Kyle Walker. We came close via Lundstram but it was wasn't to be and City went back to Manchester with the three points. Player Of The Month: Sander Berge It's another POTM award for our Norwegian and it's largely down to another strong run of performances against Fulham and Liverpool with our former record signing stepping up to smash home and get his second Premier League goal. Sander continued to be the driving force behind our midfield with his runs from the centre of the field causing problems for more or less every team that we faced in the season early doors. A very good beginning to the season for the big Norwegian geezer. Goal Of The Month: David McGoldrick VS Arsenal, Sunday 4th October 2020 This is already looking like I copy and pasted the last to bits of this article from last month's review but it is what it is. We actually scored 3 goals this month which was nice. Two of them were penalties so I guess GOTM has to go to Dave's effort against Arsenal but just because it was the only none penalty goal we scored this month doesn't mean it wasn't a good goal because it absolutely was. After picking up the ball from Baldock just outside the Arsenal 18 yard box, Dave twisted and turned a little bit and eventually found space to curl home a beautiful effort that the outstretched hand of Leno in the Arsenal goal hand no chance of reaching. It was a quality goal from a quality player. Yes this is indeed happening, it wasn't a joke in the awards article, it's that time of the year when we all reflect on the past 9 months that have just come and gone. It's safe to say that for Sheffield United those past 9 months have been pretty bad to say the least. From the heady heights of challenging for European football last year to just 11 months later being relegated as once of the worst teams to ever play in the top flight not just in the Premier League era but ever is a fairly big fall from grace. So whilst everyone enjoys the footballing spectacle of the Euro's, let's take a *ahem* 'nostalgic' look at this past season starting back in September.
A Brief(ish) Review Of The Month After the excitement of last season and many of us looking forward to us establishing ourselves as a Premier League team, United had a start to the season that perhaps should have warned us of what was to come. Starting the season 2-0 down after 10 minutes wasn't great but we did create chances in the second half of that game so surely it's just one of those things right? We followed up our opening day loss with another loss in midweek in the cup to Burnley with the Blades going out on penalties after Vydra cancelled out McGoldrick's first half opener in normal time. Our penultimate match of the month saw a return visit to the place of the ghost goal in Villa Park and there was yet more controversy at the famous old ground with John Egan harshly sent off after tugging back Ollie Watkins. United did have a penalty in the game that John Lundstram failed to convert and despite some good defending, United were eventually undone by Ezri Konsa heading home from a corner. Our luck wouldn't turn in the last match of the month in the Yorkshire derby against newly promoted Leeds with United dominating the first half having a goal ruled out for offside and Lundstram having a good opportunity saved by Meslier in the Leeds net. Bielsa's men turned it around in the second half however, it looked like United would do enough to hold on to get a first point of the season until, in the 85th minute, Patrick Bamford headed home to take 3 points home to Leeds and leave United pointless in the first month of the season. Player Of The Month: Sander Berge Our big Norwegian began to show us why we payed the money that we did back in January. He was the standout player in our midfield during the early games of the season and you could tell that this was a man that had been playing Champions League football during the previous season. He looked very dangerous with bursts from midfield against Villa and Leeds and probably should have had a penalty during the Villa game. A good start to the season for Sander. Goal Of The Month: David McGoldrick VS Burnley, Thursday 17th September 2020 Not a lot of choice for goals this month to be honest and as you'll soon see that's a bit of a trend as we get further and further into the season but we'll start with a fine goal from McGoldrick with a well worked passing move around the Burnley box eventually seeing Max Lowe burst free from his marker and put in a lovely driven cross that McGoldrick managed to stretch his leg out to a put the ball past Pope and give United the lead. |
AuthorHi my name is John and i will be giving my thoughts on the blades matches and all blades related news in this section Archives
November 2022
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