Mentally refreshed Sheffield United striker Oli McBurnie now in a good place

The Championship leaders may have been pegged back in Saturday's 1-1 draw with Birmingham City, but perspective was not hard to find.

United are now 10 league games unbeaten and McBurnie's transformation is one of the stories of their beguiling season.

He scored his first league goal since December 2020 at Luton on August 26. It proved the catalyst to a goal glut, with the forward having netted five times in his last six games. His latest was an unstoppable strike against Blues.

Fully fit and firing, the 26-year-old also admits to being in his best condition, mentally, 'for a long time' and it is showing.

Heckingbottom said: "I don't want to say too much about why I think it is different, but it's different. He (McBurnie) is where he wants to be.

"He probably did not realise that in the past, but he is where he wants and needs to be for me as a manager and where the team is, but (also) for him as a lad and person. I am pleased to see him there..

"He is on form and he has got a few now."

While some sides can suffer a play-off hangover, like Huddersfield Town have, United's form proves the opposite can also apply.

Even accounting for Saturday's draw, they have not lost since the first game of the season and have seen their colours lowered just once in the league at S2 under Heckingbottom since his appointment last November.

He added: "It probably felt like a break (test) for everyone at the club - the players, staff, fans - in how we are going to react. But chatting in there, when you are on a 10-game unbeaten run, you cannot ask for anymore. We want to keep it going.”