When will Blades be ready to play again? Tomorrow afternoon
Sheffield United’s players have lost none of their competitive streak despite the enforced sporting lockdown. Leon Wobschall reports.
THIS time last year, Sheffield United’s jubilant players were making merry and enjoying the fruits of their labours following their inspired promotion to the Premier League.
The contrast to now could not be more stark.
Blades players justifiably let their hair down last May and partied with the best of them.
Then, it was about playing hard – just as now is about working hard.
Chris Wilder’s band of footballing brothers have embraced every bit of their topflight education and the game’s shutdown has not stopped that.
To a man, according to Wilder, they have recognised that being a successful top-flight footballer involves sacrifice and dedication off the pitch as well as on it.
Their behaviour during lockdown has been ultraprofessional and standards are being driven from within, according to Wilder. In truth, he would not expect anything less.
When asked on Wednesday when his players would be ready for football’s competitive return, Wilder instantly replied: ‘Tomorrow afternoon.’
It was not said in jest either. Wilder continued: “They want to compete now and are competitors. To be a footballer, you have to got to do a lot of things right to have a career.
“To get to the Premier League
and in this position, they (players) have not had their heads stuck in a fridge.
“They have come back in magnificent shape and shown a responsibilty to their profession to keep themselves in good nick.
“It is a different scenario. People keep talking about the length of time (without football).
“But they have not been to Dubai or (Las) Vegas or wherever they go in these beach clubs and parties and drinking and eating whatever they want. They have kept themselves in brilliant nick.
“They knew that the season was paused – and that is what it was.
“It wasn’t postponed or finished before the Newcastle game (scheduled for March 14), it was paused. We have done our testing and are delighted with how everyone has come through. Everybody is fit and healthy.”
Blades players returned to small-scale training on Tuesday afternoon as part of the Premier League’s Project Restart, with June 19 having been mooted as a potential date for a return to action, all being well.
Wilder equates any gap between now and a scheduled resumption of action next month as being the equivalent of a mini pre-season.
It is something that players should be comfortable with and one that is par for the course for many leading Premier League players.
If Wilder’s players want to be successful over a period of time, they had better get used to it.
Wilder, whose side are in the quarter-finals of the FA Cup and are pushing for European qualification following a brilliant first season back in the big time, continued: “When players are talking about going on international tours and playing in major tournaments and coming back and having a couple of weeks rest and two or three weeks of pre-season, they are back playing.
“That will be the case from our point of view.
“We will have two or three (training) games behind closed doors ourselves. It isn’t going to be the same, but we have to adapt and compromise as it is unprecedented times.
“But the bigger picture is getting back working like everybody else.
“If everyone else can do it, certainly we can do it.”