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“Should auld acquaintance be forgot, and never brought to mind?”

In the case of the recent Sheffield United managerial situation, befitting of its own Norse Saga, I think it would be best.

It all started so brightly for Gary “Speedo” Speed (the creative force of football fans never ceases to amaze me). The first day on the job, he said : “I think at this time I’d be silly to pass up the opportunity. I know the club, I know the players, I know the fans, so hopefully that will give me the best chance to be successful… Sunday’s result is very important, but longer term I want to build a culture within the club and be recognised as a successful brand in this country and around the world.”

Gary Speed laughing at Kevin Blackwell as he leaves Bramall Lane Stage Right

As it turned out, “Sunday’s result” left a lot to be desired, but the performance was promising. A 1-0 loss away at Middlesborough was impressive for a club still rocking from sacking their tiring manager, Kevin Blackwell, two games into the season.

Better football was being played, with a young manager at the helm. United fans were cautiously optimistic, and- dare I say it?- patient. I recall many a fan saying “Give Speedo time, it won’t click straight away, but it will eventually”.

That feeling certainly soured sharpish.

Speed trying to figure out which goal the team think they are attacking

Some sneaky 1-0 wins, and at times good performances were enough to keep him employed, but there was always something lacking, something which hadn’t been seen at the club since the Pantomime Dame himself, Neil Warnock. Genuine passion for the welfare of the Blades. Speed will turn into a decent manager: that, for me, is a certainty. However, he was never a ‘Unitedite’. Neither, although he will beg to differ, was Blackwell (memories of him saying in his charming southern accent “Oim a Blaaayde Oi Aaym, froo and froo” are flooding back to me). And please don’t get me started on Bryan Robson. Captain Marvel he wasn’t.

A new face was needed immediately. And here is where our good friends from across the M4 toll-bridge came to the rescue.

£5.50 on the toll bridge

The Welsh F.A., in need of a new manager after the departure of the long reigning John Toshack, decided to do the logical thing and appoint an unproven ex-player with a less than good start to his managerial career. But he is Welsh, so that’s fine then.

With compensation money in hand, the Sheffield United Board could now search high and low for the new saviour, who would without doubt deliver us to the Promised Land of the Premiership, and have us playing in the Champions’ League in under 5 years. I may mock, but there were some genuinely good managers on the shortlist:

Chris Hughton

"And that's just Mike Ashley's Collar Size!"

Good manager. I was shocked when he was fired as manager of Newcastle, as there was nothing to warrant this.

Sean O’Driscoll

Dancing in the streets of Doncaster as Sean actually opens his mouth to speak

Would have loved him to manage us, although now is maybe not the right time. He would need a season to change our playing style, and we don’t have that luxury.

And, not forgetting Phil Brown

However, the Board did something no fan thought they would ever see: they took their time deciding. Having put John Carver in charge as Caretaker Manager, who it should be noted went about his business in a civilised and thoughtful manner, Trevor Birch set about doing illogical things like having interviews, and asking the advice of professionals about who would be right as our next manager.

Professionals. Except football-related.

Eventually, just before the start of the New Year, a decision was made. Micky Adams, a lifelong Blade, would take charge, with Alan (he’s got no hair but we don’t care, Alan Alan) Cork as his assistant.

Adams and Cork, with a disappointing lack of facial hair

Adams, who has managed 9 other clubs before United, was delighted to have landed the job, and it was obvious that this was a dream fulfilled, as he walked out before his first game in charge and kissed the badge.

It will be a hard slog for him. Sitting fourth bottom of the Championship, and leaking goals like the pipes at Sheffield Wednesday accidentally leak water, the signs are not good. However, we have regained the passion needed in a manager at this club. We may not play the most attractive football, but we never give up. Adams said in his first interview as boss that:

“I’ve always supported the Blades and my favourite player growing up was Tony Currie. He was and still is my biggest idol. When you’re a kid you follow your team and I followed Sheffield United”.

Add to that the comment that he has some family from “the dark side of Sheffield”, namely Hillsbrough, and the trouble he was in after making pig gestures at the Wednesday fans whilst manager of Leicester, and you have a manager who has Sheffield United running through his blood. The fact that he only lost 19 out of 81 games in charge of Port Vale helps his case as well.

This isn’t a ‘new’ Sheffield United. This is a return to the old, raw days of Basset and Warnock, where effort and determination were just as important attributes as fancy southern ‘skill’.

So here’s to a better year for Sheffield United. I’m sure wherever our fortunes lie, it won’t be boring. It never is, unfortunately.

Happy New Year!

Good Luck Micky!

I thought that I’d let all the hype surrounding John Terry die down before adding my two penneth.

There is no doubt that Terry is a brilliant centre-back, one of the best in the world, which can only mean good things for both Chelsea and England. Furthermore, his leadership qualities are arguably second to none. That is, if we ignore a leader’s duty as a role model to children throughout the world.

Fabio Capello dealt with the situation in a calm and proper manner. It took him just twelve minutes to tell Terry that he was to be stripped of the England captaincy. Most of that time was spent by Terry searching for a tie after the England Manager had decided a sacking needed to be a tad more formal than a coffee-and-cake elevenses chat.

So, who was Capello to choose as the next England captain? Let’s run through the candidates, and their credentials:

Rio Ferdinand: influential, long-time centre back for one of the best teams in the world. The perfect candidate, apart from the fact that he missed a major drugs test earlier in his career, and has been banned from driving four times, the last time for driving “at an average of 105.9mph over a distance of two miles”.

Ashley Cole: arguably the best left-back in the world at the moment, he is a regular in a successful Chelsea team, and be called upon to perform. Perform in more ways than one, having been dumped by his wife, the lovely Cheryl Tweedy for having an affair, and sending revealing pictures from his mobile phone.

Steven Gerrard: A midfield giant in the game, loyal player for Liverpool from Academy level. Consistently rated in the top ten football players in the world. Let’s ignore his charge of attempted GBH (the charge was quashed, to be fair to him) and his hypocrisy about fairness in the game.

Frank Lampard: Probably the closest to a captain I can find in the squad- club captain, knows how to inspire people, but his performances for England are too inconsistent. However, there have been a spate of unseemly controversies that he has been involved in: appearing in a sex tape with Kieron Dyer and the current captain Ferdinand in 2000, and drunkenly abusing grieving American tourists a day after the September 11th attacks.

All of the players above would be decent candidates for the captaincy if it were not for their personal lives. However, in this day and age, where we live in a completely media saturated world, the pressures on these players are great. It doesn’t excuse their actions, but these actions may not have come into the public domain were it not for papers like News of the World, which seems to have a list of famous footballers, which they go through to try and find some sordid story about them.

Although I don’t like saying it, I’m sure some of the players from years gone by have had affairs, got drunk and done something they regretted. However, they got away with it more often, as the media didn’t have the complete freedom to intrude into people’s personal lives as they seem to now.

There is a new generation of English players coming through the ranks, players like Jack Rodwell. I just hope that with the growing pressures on footballers, young leaders can also remember the duty they have to become role models for children across the globe.

Matthew Kilgallon, arguably Sheffield United’s best player, has left the club to join Sunderland in a deal worth 2 million pounds. This is worth 1.6 million to United I believe, as Leeds will receive 400 thousand pounds from the deal with a sell on clause.

Kilgallon has never hidden his desire to play in the Premiership, and at 26 it’s no surprise he has left. However, the way the hair-highlighted, ‘too-good-for-this-league’ player has acted during the past few months has been ridiculous.

For a player whose favourite move is, in his own words, “the backwards header to the goalkeeper”, he really scored an own goal in the eyes of United fans with his apparent lack of loyalty. We don’t know how much of the talk of frustration and impatience was actually him or just his agent trying to hike up his attraction, but surely the feelings must have originated from the defender himself.

Kilgallon, to me, has been a good defender during his time with the Blades, but he is massively over-hyped. A prodigious talent at Leeds, he moved to the Blades in a £1.75 million deal, while we were still in the Premiership, and needed back-up in an ultimately too-porous defence. Since then, he has been almost ever-present, and grown a reputation for consistently quality performances.

On his day, ’Napoleon Dynamite’ (see below) can be very good, but he is by no means consistent in my opinion. Since the talk started of his transfer, his performances have dipped dramatically, and he was affected so much that he was left out of the team.

                Napoleon Dynamite                                                                                                                Matthew Kilgallon

This transfer completely mirrors the previous one. Sunderland, who shipped 7 goals against a supreme Chelsea side, need back-up for their defence. No doubt Kilgallon will become a regular for them, not just a back-up player, but I hope for Sunderland’s sake that he doesn’t begin to set his eyes on a better Premiership team next year. They’ll tell from the performances.

‘Killa’ as he is known (a more unsuitable nickname I cannot think of) has been very successful, and I wish him the best of luck. I’m disappointed that he acted in the way he did, which has left a bitter taste in my mouth, but ultimately, his ambition was higher than the quality of our football.

I have no idea how United will spend the money. I hope that it will be invested on new players, as we are a couple of players light. However, I’m not holding out for this scenario. Most probably our erudite Chairman Mr. McCabe will announce an exciting new business plan where we either buy shares in the first Antarctic football team, or add four new rooms onto our hotel. You never know with the Blades.

Sheffield United seem to have signed Mark Yeates, the 24 year old winger from Middlesbrough, for around 500k, and his medical was meant to have been yesterday morning.

This is a vital signing in my opinion. For some reason the omniscient Kevin Blackwell decided to sell David Cotterill, our only vessel of creativity (albeit a very inconsistent vessel) for half a million pounds to Swansea. Since then, I have felt that our side has lacked danger in the final third. Jamie Ward has tried and succeeded in bringing some of that back, but with Yeates, we appear to going in the right direction.

I’m not surprised with the level of the signing. Since relegation from the Premiership, we’ve been losing money, the reins have been tightened drastically. However, this has made us look for better deals. See Ward as the perfect example.

Hopefully Yeates, whom I know little about, can bring another good attacking option to our side. We are in dire need of a winger.

It seems strange that United haven’t said anything more on the subject. Maybe the funds just aren’t there at the moment? Yeates seems good, but I wouldn’t want to sell a footballer for him. Maybe sell Montgomery then

UPDATE!! Yeates has now actually signed, for an undisclosed fee. Seems as if we did have the funds!

Last month in Zurich, Lionel Messi took home the title of World Player of the Year. He received 1047 points in the voting, miles ahead of Cristiano Ronaldo, who gained 352 points, and Xavi, with 196. At the glittering awards ceremony, Messi also won the Ballon D’Or, giving him the title as Europe’s best player, from a Barcelona side who have won an unprecedented number of cups throughout European competitions.

Before the actual night, the 23-man shortlist list included seven players from the Premiership, and sixteen more players from around Europe that are at the height of the game.

Nearly every position was covered, from Real Madrid’s commanding number one Iker Casillas, to Liverpool’s personification of verve Fernando Torres. Surely therefore, every player has a fair chance of becoming the new global icon?

Not by a long shot.

On the list, the world’s most exciting players were on show, players like Cristiano Ronaldo, Kaka, and the eventual winner, Lionel Messi. However, there was a distinct lack of defensive players. There were two players that would be called out and out defenders (Puyol and Terry), and two goalkeepers (Buffon and the aforementioned Casillas).

In an age of the game where defence is more important than ever, how can FIFA, and indeed the national coaches and captains that actually vote, overlook the players that are the base of a successful season?

Since its introduction in 1991, only two defensive players have won the award. In the first year, Lothar Matthaus was nominated after commanding performances in the 1990 World Cup, leading his national team to victory. However, only three defensive players came anywhere near winning again until 2006, when Fabio Cannavaro won, after once more captaining his national team to World Cup glory. It seems that defenders need to do more than other players to be noticed by the world.

Do not misunderstand me. The players that have won the award were definitely at the top of the game. Messi has sparked the football world with his pace and ability, and the statistics surrounding him do not lie. However, merit should not just be awarded on how many goals are scored, or how good a player’s tricks are. It should also be based on what the player brings to the team. My faith in football was revitalised when Frank Lampard won the Football Writers’ Association Player of the Year Award yesterday. Although he scored his fair share of goals, it was not just his attacking ability that merited the win. He has for the past few years been the rock of Chelsea’s team. I am no Chelsea fan, but a player like Lampard is in my eyes more deserving of this award than a player like Ronaldo.

Ultimately, the award is given to the player who has excited fans the most. It is about style, power, glory; not about stability, tackling, or loyalty. Even in the era of a 1-0 scraped win, the power to excite is an essential tool in any great player. Therefore, from the off, defenders are at a distinct disadvantage. They do not have the pretty job of taking shots at goal. They cannot make mistakes or gaffes like the best strikers do regularly.

Whatever FIFA may say about the World Player of the Year Award, to me it is merely a money making scheme. The hype around the award is immense, and the winner undoubtedly gains much more than pride. I am without doubt that Messi deserves the accolade and the attention that comes with it, but until we make the judging fair on all players, we will never know who the truly best player is.

2010 brings a better chance of a defender winning the title: the world cup is the perfect place for a commanding centre-back to attract the eyes of the footballing world. Here’s hoping next year’s winner is a certain Mr. John Terry.

Hello! My name is David Taylor, and I’ve been wanting to write a football blog for a while. Since I started my gap year, I’ve been looking for things to do, and what better than write about a passion of mine for many years?

So enjoy reading my ongoing posts, and feel free to comment!

David