Northenders. (and Blades fans) On Wednesday night we welcome the Blades from the City of steel in the White Rose County of Yorkshire to play PNE in their rearranged League Div 1 fixture. For your interest, below is a brief summary of their proud history. This has been posted previously on the old 606 forum, but this is an opportunity for those who didn't see it then to take a look now. The City of Sheffield has been described as the home of association football. The game was played here as long ago as 1793, when a match was played involving six men on each side. The first football match at Bramall Lane took place in December 1862. The participating teams were Sheffield Club and Hallam. The match lasted for three hours and resulted in a goal-less draw. Sheffield Club is still in existence and is recognised as the oldest club in membership of the Football Association. Bramall Lane. Is one of the oldest sports enclosures in the Country. It was originally a Cricket ground and was used for both football and cricket until 1973. Until 1973 it was a three sided ground allowing the the two games to take place. The ground was initially used, on important occasions, by Sheffield Wednesday. On 16 March 1889, the FA cup Semi-Final between PNE and West Brom was played at the Lane. The gate receipts were £574 - a large amount of money in those days, and it prompted a suggestion that a Sheffield United Football Club should be formed. On 22 March 1889 a meeting was held and it was decided to run a football team in conjunction with the Sheffield United Cricket Club. In May 1892 the United joined the recently formed Second Division of the Football League, and won promotion at their first attempt. In those early years, many famous players wore the red-and white shirt and at one time in 1903, the club had no fewer than twelve International players on its books. During this period United won the First Division and the FA Cup four times. They were also beaten Finalists on two occasions. Having been relegated in 1934, United returned to the First Division in 1939, when the League was suspended because of WW2. The immediate post-war period was marked by the brilliance of Jimmy Hagan, whom many consider to be United's greatest ever player. It was also the start of a series of fairly regular promotions and relegation's with United moving up and down between first and second Divisions on no fewer than seven occasions, between 1949 and 1976. The most memorable post-war run was in 1971. Ending the 70/71 season promoted, United took the first division by storm and had an unbeaten run of 22 games. This success brought to a head the long-standing argument about about the desirability of playing football and cricket at the same ground and a decision was taken to provide a fourth side to what was essentially a three-sided stadium. The new stand seating 7746 people was opened in 1975. Unfortunately, this coincided with a slump in fortunes. Relegation to Div 2 in 1976, and then Third and finally fourth in 1981. Things took a turn for the better in 1982, United were promoted to Div 3 and under the leadership of Manager Dave Bassett won promotion to the First Division. With the formation of the Premiership in 1992. United became a founder member and finished that inaugural season in 14th place. The Blades were relegated to the Championship in 1994. The Blades were promoted back to the Premier League in 2006, which ended amidst controversy after just one season. Despite reaching the Championship play-off final in 2009, further decline followed, where an over reliance on loan players and the sale of the club's star players saw The Blades relegated to the third tier of English football (along with PNE) for the first time in 23 years. Like many English clubs, Sheffield United supporters have a wide variety of chants and songs, the most famous of which is The Greasy Chip Butty Song. We may well hear it ringing out at Deepdale. The Blades home kit is red and white vertical stripes and black shorts. United Honours. Division one Champions :- 1897-98 Runners-up :- 1896-97, 1889-1900 Division Two Champions : 1952-53 Runners-up :- 1892-93, 1938-39, 1960-61, 1970-71, 1989-90 Championship Runners-up :- 2006 Division Four Champions :- 1981-82 FA Cup Winners :- 1899, 1902, 1915, 1925 Runners-up :- 1901, 1936 United Managers. Joe Mercer Ian Porterfield Dave Bassett Howard Kendall Neil Warnock Legends. Jimmy Hagan Tony Currie Billy Gillespie Alan Hodgkinson (more than 675 United appearences) Alan Kelly (Jr) (Preston born and ex PNE) Alan Woodward Joe Shaw The Blades made a draw today against their arch rivals the Owls which leaves them one point behind Northend before Wednesday's fixture. Northend have now lost two consecutive league games but due to many of yesterday's results their league position remains more or less the same and they still have two games in hand on the majority of their league rivals. The blades have one game in hand and Wednesday night's game will use up one of those games in hand for PNE. PNE did not play well yesterday as they hadn't in their previous league fixture so need to get back to winning ways if they are to maintain a challenge at the top end of the division. Having lost Hume and now Mellor through injury PNE could be up against it when it comes to replacing them for the Blades game. Just as pressing is the need for Northend to stop shipping goals and looking threatened every time a team attacks them. Many fans believe the team formation needs changing (I would stongly agree) but will Phil Brown take the bull by the horns and change things. One thing for sure Northend will have to put in a far better shift on Wednesday if they are to take all three points. What do you think, was Saturday just a bad day in the office or do the PNE problems run deeper than that and if so what should Phil Brown be doing about it. Can Phil Brown do anything about it with the players at his disposal. Can Northend rise to the occasion against the Blades as they have done in the past against better opposition ????? Your thoughts/opinions are welcome on this thread.
bad news this morning is that both Hume and Mellor are major doubts for Weds and indeed Sat... I personally think PB is going to have to get in to the emergency loan market as going in with just Proc and JT (assuming he is fit... not on the bench sat!) would put us in a very weak position! Would be interesting to see who is potentially available from a Prem/Championship club... suddenly all the talk is about where are goals going to come from, but let's not forget the main problem all season has been lack of clean sheets. I fear unless we bring in an emergency loan, get the place buzzing again, we could come back with 0 points from two games and be slipping out of touch of the promotion places....
I don't like the 4 3 3 formation Brown is using, unless the middle three are on the ball the defence is threatened. If the middle three stay tight in midfield then the threat comes down the flanks, if they are wider apart then the centre of defence is threatened. The players have to be good to play with three in the middle, I am believe that they are not up to the job so change has to be brought about by Phil Brown.
After tonight's match we are now in crisis. We have a team that seems not to follow even the basic principles of defence and a management team that, despite overwhelming evidence of the need for change, carries on regardless. The difference between United and Preston was alarming. United made each opportunity count despite having much less of the play. Preston attacks were met by a solid wall of defenders while Preston defenders went missing, or backed off when united attacked. And there are great doubts about Ian Turner. I for one thought that he fared badly with three of the goals although I agree that he had little cover upfront. We are not promotional material rather an ordinary mid table side that relies too much on the abilities of a couple of individuals of which ian Hume stands out. Must say that it is time for Procter and Mayor to be given a rest. They are frankly not good enough at this stage.
A strange game with some very inept defending from both sides, Phillips confused Smith early on and scored easily, for 15 minutes we made them look like World beaters then woke up to the fact that they were just as bad as us. A 60 yrd run by Mayor lifted us and from a free kick Carlisle scored a strange goal, headed the ball into the groundit bounced up over Simonsen and dipped under the bar. Fell asleep for the 2nd a back heel set Phillips in again. Early Blades pressure in the 2nd half before we took over a fine move led to Hume equalising and from then on in there was only going to be one winner and it wasn't the Blades. Simonsen made a brilliant one handed save from Coutts but within a minute Turner failed to save a shot from Williamson behind again. No return this time Williamson scored again to end the game. Great going forward rank at the back obviously must have played with some of Lashers defenders.
I think that somewhere between tommyt's and maclad's comments lies my thoughts on last night's awful result. I have to say that at no stage was I confident that Northend would win, even during the two ten minute periods that Northend were on top. During those two periods I always thought the result could go either way, due to poor PNE defending. I also thought that United's defence were comfortable for much of the game as opposed to Northend's defence that looked vulnerable every time United went forward. This was because the central two defenders are slow and the midfield again gave the back four little or know protection. I saw little difference last night from all the other home games I have seen this season, and we could have lost all those as well. Northend are some way off having a good team and there is much to be done. Hume was in a different class than the rest of the team, with only Coutts being the other threat to the Blades defence. For me a poor performance and result. Thanks for the comments guys..
