Blades fearful of suffering same downward spiral as neighbours

Once fans start singing this, you really do have problems because no other chant delivers such a damning verdict on the running of a football club.

Prior to last Saturday, it had been over 10 years since those poisoned words had passed the lips of the average Sheffield United supporter.

Not since the car park protests against Mike McDonald back in 1999 had they vented such anger towards a Bramall Lane hierarchy.

Yet here they are, only four years on from a one-season stay in the Premier League, telling Plc chairman Kevin McCabe to sling his hook.

Sheffield United? Not anymore. And the reason for the break-up? Simple: they fear the club they love will soon be relegated to the third tier of English football for the first time in 22 years.

With 12 games to play, the Blades are six points adrift of safety and 13 league games without a win. It is their longest sequence without a win since March 2008 when former England captain Bryan Robson lost his job as manager during a depressing 10-game barren patch.

The worst spell in the club’s history lasted 19 games – under Jimmy Sirrell in the 1975-76 season – and it goes without saying that the Blades were relegated after that.

New manager Micky Adams has been spared the brunt of the fans’ anger so far and rightly so.

It is not Adams’s fault that the Blades are once again relying on loan signings to compete with other clubs in the Championship.

Neither is Adams to blame for the departure of three other managers from the club this season.

Or the collapse of the property market where McCabe invested so much of the club’s money during the last decade.

All three of these factors have contributed to this season’s woes.

Adams, a lifelong Blades supporter as well as a manager with a proven track record for reviving struggling teams, is merely trying to pick up the pieces.

Whether he will stay in his job if results continue to disappoint remains to be seen.

As much as supporters will sympathise with his plight, they still need something, even just a couple of victories, to cling to. Without that, how can anyone be expected to keep the faith?

Overall, the performances under Adams have not been as bad as the results suggest.

There has been improved passion and commitment and there has also been bad luck, especially in games against Norwich City, Leicester City, Crystal Palace and Derby County. Although the quality falls short of the standards set in recent years, the Blades are still as good as around a dozen other teams in this season’s Championship.

Injuries have also been an issue.

Without centre-back Chris Morgan, midfielder Nick Montgomery and striker Darius Henderson the team is missing three players who would immediately strengthen its spine.

Blades chief executive Trevor Birch, the man hired by McCabe to run the club last season, has already allowed Adams to sign five loan players and two on permanent deals.

The Blades would need to borrow extra money to bring in many more this season and, as they are currently locked in an arrangement to repay a £15m debt to the Santander Bank by 2013, that is unlikely to happen. The future of the club rests mainly on the performance of its existing players.

There are many other clubs in the Yorkshire region who have already been through what the Blades are going through right now.

Barnsley, Bradford City, Leeds United and Sheffield Wednesday have all slid a slope from Premier League to League One in the last 13 years. In the case of Bradford, that slope has even extended to League Two and may yet take the club out of the Football League.

The Bantams entered administration twice due to their inability to balance the books and a succession of managers were unable to turn the tide.

Once a club starts going backwards, the only solution to the problem is usually major new investment but sugar daddies are hard to find.

Barnsley, a Premier League club in 1998, had software tycoon Patrick Cryne to thank for reviving their fortunes after two relegations and an administration. Cryne rescued his hometown club in 2004 and the Tykes duly returned to the Championship in 2006.

Former Chelsea chairman Ken Bates took over at Leeds in 2005 after mounting a failed takeover bid for Wednesday.

Bates, now 79, wanted one last challenge in the game but the extent of the problems at Elland Road still brought administration and a second relegation – three years after the club waved farewell to the Premier League.

The added hurdle of a 15-point penalty from the Football League delayed Leeds’s return to the Championship by two years but the club now appears to be blossoming again and is chasing a return to the top flight.

Back at Wednesday, the arrival of former Portsmouth and Leicester City chairman Milan Mandaric at Hillsborough this season has finally heralded the dawn of a new era. The multi-millionaire wiped out debts of £26m and wasted no time in bringing new players to the club. He has already sacked his first manager, Alan Irvine, and now hopes former player Gary Megson will steer the club in the right direction. If the Blades are to put the brakes on their decline, history suggests they will also need to find a new investor.

Regardless of his apparent ‘love’ for the Blades, McCabe has discovered how quickly fortunes can change in football.

A hero not so long ago for fighting the ‘injustice’ of relegation from the Premier League, McCabe is now perceived as the bad guy. By finding a creditable buyer for the club, he could still leave with his head held high.