In League One, I went to Bramall Lane earlier on in the season to see Sheffield United 3 Torquay United 2 in the FA cup 2nd round. I've recently been there again - the picture above is a game I was at a couple of weeks ago, where it finished Sheffield United 3 Leyton Orient 1. With 3 games to go, this result put Sheffield United 5 points clear of Sheffield Wednesday, and at that point it looked like the gap was too much to be turned around. It would take one hell of a choke from United for it to happen.
As that week went on however, United's star striker Ched Evans, who'd scored the third goal at the weekend and in the games I saw easily looked Premier League quality, was involved in the trial accused of rape, and subsequently jailed for 5 years.
I gather with Evans that, in his earlier years as a promising Man City youth player, his personal life wasn't exactly too rosey, and as a result he wasn't focused enough on his football, causing him to really waste his premier league opportunity. But after initially not fulfilling his potential, it was claimed his mind was now purely on football, and this was why he was finding top form at Sheffield United. Obviously this very much throws that out of the window!
What a disastrous effect the loss of Ched Evans has had on Sheffield United, as they went from being 5 points above Wednesday with 3 games left to finishing 3 points behind Wednesday at the end, an astonishing swing of 8 points in 3 games. Yes they may still go up in the play offs, and on paper are favourites, but with such a dramatic loss of form, can they really manage to bring back belief and just turn form back on like a switch in the space of a week, when they must have thought automatic promotion was on a plate for them?
No comments:
Post a Comment