Chris Wilder admission as Sheffield United fail to join Leeds United and Burnley with message for victors
Sheffield United were beaten 2-1 by Sunderland in Saturday’s Championship play-off final.
Blades boss Chris Wilder made a frank Sheffield United admission in the face of Saturday’s Championship play-off final defeat as his side failed to join Leeds United and Burnley in the Premier League.
The Blades regularly looked like sealing automatic promotion at either Leeds or Burnley’s expense but Wilder’s side eventually had to settle for the play-offs in finishing ten points behind the pair in third place.
Wilder’s men finished a huge 14 points clear of fourth-placed Sunderland but the Black Cats ultimately had the last laugh by recording a comeback 2-1 success in Saturday afternoon’s Wembley play-off final.
Speaking post match, Wilder pulled no punches in admitting just how much the failure to go up would hurt as he declared that it would take “a while” for the Blades to recover.
Wilder, though, took the reverse on the chin as he issued a classy message of congratulations to the Premier League-bound Black Cats
“First of all, congratulations to Regis, the players and the staff and the supporters of Sunderland Football Club,” said Wilder, as quoted by the YEP’s sister title The Star.
“We've had the taste of Premier League, we know what a great experience it is and the experience that they'll have next season.
“It’s going to take quite a while to get over this and we're going to have to suffer and go through the pain.
“It wasn't any spin or anything in terms of the preparation of the players. Going into the play-offs and going into the final, it was as good as I've experienced at a football club.
“There were certain times in the game we can look at from our point of view, where we needed to be better with and the opportunities that have come around for the opposition, they've taken and punished us severely. “
Wilder added: “We started getting back in control of the game 10 minutes into the second half, and we had a couple of chances.
“When a team has to open up and go for it, which they did, and we'd have been the same. We were too loose in transition and on the counter-attack. We gave up some really good, clean opportunities to go and punish them.
“And if we got the second, then I think we win the game. I never felt on the sideline worried and that we needed to do something. But the two goals from our point of view are really poor. They found the finishes, but for the second goal we need to secure the ball at the top of the pitch but we don’t and the middle of the park is wide open.
“It’s amazing what stories the game can bring up. A local lad on his way to Brighton, counters and finds a fabulous position and a finish. And then the game's gone past us, it's 97 or 98 minutes. So it’s fairy tale stuff for the boy and for Sunderland. For us, it's going to take quite a while to get over.”