Sheff Utd set to sack Wilder after play-off defeat
Sheffield United are today expected to confirm the departure of manager Chris Wilder after they failed to secure an immediate return to the Premier League.Former Southampton, Reading and Hull City manager, Ruben Selles, is expected to take over at Bramall Lane after Wilder's departure is confirmed.The Blades finished third in the Championship but lost to Sunderland in injury time in the play-off final last month.Wilder, 57, was in his second spell in charge of his boyhood team and had been looking to guide them to promotion for the third time.His imminent exit means that of the three teams who failed to go up through the Championship play-offs, only Coventry City will start next season with the same manager with whom they ended last season.Wilder initially took over at Bramall Lane in May 2016 and guided them to the League One title in his first season in charge.Promotion to the Premier League followed two years later in 2019 and they finished ninth in their first season in the top flight.However, they struggled badly the following season, and Wilder was sacked in March 2021 with relegation inevitable.He had spells with Middlesbrough and Watford and then returned to Bramall Lane in December 2023 after Paul Heckingbottom was sacked with the Blades bottom of the Premier League.
Two-point deduction
Wilder was unable to arrest the slide, as they ended the season having conceded 101 goals and accumulated just 16 points.They started last season with a two-point deduction because of missed transfer payments in the 2022-23 campaign but challenged at the top of the division throughout.A long-mooted takeover by American-based consortium COH Sports was completed in December, and Wilder signed a new three-year deal in January.With seven games to go, they were two points clear at the top of the league. But they then lost their matches in eight days to Oxford United, Millwall and Plymouth Argyle.While another defeat at Burnley - a fourth in five games - condemned them to the play-offs, despite finishing the regular season with 90 points. They cruised into the play-off final with a thumping 6-0 aggregate win over Bristol City and took the lead in the final at Wembley against the Black Cats.A second goal was controversially ruled out by VAR - the only match in the Championship in which the system was used all season - and Sunderland came back to equalise.Then down to 10 men temporarily with a player off injured and all their substitutes used, the Blades saw Tommy Watson score a 95th-minute winner for the Black Cats.It stretched their wretched run in the play-offs to no successes from 10 attempts and leaves them facing up to another season in the second tier.
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