Bristol City v Sheffield United: "Shut up and behave": Chris Wilder on Championship play-offs and Robins' respect

They are very rarely safe or boring. Perhaps understandably so, the fare on offer ahead of his Sheffield United side's play-off first leg at Bristol City was comparatively modest and pretty restrained.

At this time of year; play-off time, the importance of games does not need to be spelt out or re-emphasised. Seasons are literally on the line and it’s about deeds and not words. Football people like Wilder know that full well.

That said, there was a spot of entertainment late on in Wilder’s latest musings, when he was asked if another year in the Championship might not necessarily be too bad a thing, less than 12 months into a major rebuild.

He instantly retorted: "Shut up and behave... When that door opens, you are not taking that route of not stepping through.

"You have to take the opportunity because it’s so precious as you have to work so hard to get into that position. So when that door opens, you have to step through it.”

Aside from that moment of animation, Wilder remained on script. The time for verbal joshing with journalists can wait. Rightly so. And well prepared too. The questions about his side finishing 22 points above play-off semi-final opponent Bristol City were always going to arrive.

The sixth-placed Robins’ tally of 68 points is the joint lowest 46-game total for a side to reach the second-tier play-offs since the format was introduced in 1986-87.

Wilder’s answers were factual and possessed common sense. His side were pushed all the way in a draw against City in March - and were perhaps slightly fortunate to draw - while it took a goal in the eighth minute of stoppage time to win at Ashton Gate on November 5.

City’s home record was also only bettered by the top three in 2024-25 - they have been beaten just once in the league on home soil since November 23.

The Blades chief also understands the EFL circuit better than most to know that football fervour extends well beyond the big-city clubs of the North and Midlands. Like his old club Oxford, for example, and Bristol; the place often cited as the largest city in England to have never staged Premier League football.

Wilder would understandably like to keep it that way, but acknowledges the task in hand.

He said: “We are going there to win, but understand we are going to have to play very, very well to win at Ashton Gate in front of a very passionate and vociferous home crowd.

“I have talked about teams getting 100 points and 90 points. But teams getting into the play-offs have had to get a lot of things right this season.

“Look at the teams who haven’t done a lot of things right who have fallen through the trapdoor - big clubs who have been in the Premier League who are way below us and Bristol City. Full credit to Liam (Manning) and his team, it’s an outstanding achievement.

"We are going up against a really talented side, we have had two incredibly tight games with them and our away record is good and their home record is good. I don’t think any of these games between the four (play-off) teams are going to be runaways. There will be some twists and turns in both games and we are going to have to suffer in points and enjoy it in others."

For both clubs, there are no shortage of incentives to make it through and be standing with a Wembley ticket by the end of the second instalment at Bramall Lane on Monday evening - both individually and collectively.

Gus Hamer and Callum O’Hare copped play–off despair with Coventry in 2002-23, for instance, while in the previous two seasons, Harrison Burrows was eliminated in the semi-finals with Peterborough.

The Blades’ own play-off sojourns have been well chronicled, while City’s big previous Championship moment in the end-of-season lottery was a bitter one, losing to a Dean Windass-inspired Hull City at Wembley in May 2008.

Wilder commented: "I think there’s all different stories right the way through every part of it. Through supporters - through history and negatives - through us, with positives, and the players who want to achieve and those who want to get back in the Premier League who played last year who have unfinished business. And the younger players who have started their journey. It’s right the way through the group; individual stories.

"But we have to bring it together to make sure the story is a positive play-off one, achieving something no other team has achieved here and having the celebrations that the two other clubs have had."

Leeds and Burnley, just in case you were wondering..