Sheffield United fight to rescue promotion push
Kevin Blackwell fears Sheffield United's injury mayhem is fated to continue for the rest of a chaotic season as he fights to rescue a promotion push.
Striker Ched Evans could face an operation to pin his shoulder, while the other casualties of a dismal midweek defeat to bottom club Peterborough, Jamie Ward and Lee Williamson, look to be out indefinitely with hamstring pulls.
"The whole season has been like this and I see no reason why it should change," said a frustrated Blackwell, who takes little consolation from Darius Henderson's return from suspension against Neil Warnock's Queens Park Rangers on Saturday. "It's like robbing Peter to pay Paul," he added.
"Ched spent Tuesday night in hospital before being released. It looks as though his shoulder is not broken but there's a possibility he's popped a joint and might have to have it pinned - as happened to Bryan Robson around the time of the 1986 World Cup. Either way, Ched is out for a while.
"The problem is that I'm unable to field a settled side and can't get any stability into the team."
Take out Chris Morgan and Nick Montgomery and the rest of the midweek line-up total only around 150 Blades' appearances between them. Blackwell is still getting to know many of them and is only just discovering how some will react in tough times. He will inevitably put their character under the microscope considering the fragility of the side's away form.
United's sudden game of catch-up in the play-off stakes is a theme that might also occupy the mind of a certain former manager this weekend. Win at Bramall Lane on Saturday and Warnock's QPR will be only two points behind the Blades - with a game in hand. Not that Blackwell's depleted side can afford to dwell on such negative thoughts before what might be viewed, given such a dramatic change of landscape, as the fixture from hell.
Cardiff's defeat at Ipswich on Tuesday was scant consolation for United losing at Peterborough, but at least it means no ground - other than another game played - was lost. The gap is just five points and Blackwell's men can go a long way to plugging it. . . providing they win both of two home games in the next five days, with Blackpool to follow on Tuesday.
Such desperate need is the price for the team's acute split personality disorder. Nine unbeaten at home, seven successive defeats away - that's some case study. But then so is the chronic injury record this season.
Equally, the team and manager can't be divorced from the state of the club as a whole amid difficult times financially. A predictable struggle has to be seen in that context.
Of all the managers heading into town, Warnock, who can smell blood a mile away, would be the last anyone at the Lane would pick right now.
It's not only his nose - Warnock's tail is also well and truly up. Such are the slim margins in the Championship that winning both his first two games as Rangers boss has given a relegation-threatened side a sudden sniff of the play-offs.
Even if United negotiate the next week successfully, the real problem lies ahead; how to cure the travel sickness. The stand-out statistic is that
they have scored only three goals in those seven point-less games.
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Thursday 09 February 2012
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