Run your finger along the list of Premier League towns and cities and there’s a
glaring omission: Sheffield. The Steel City has a rich football heritage and the only
Premier League city with a bigger population is London. Sheffield has a population
of around 558,000 and its total metropolitan area is 1.6 million, making it the third
largest English district by number of people.
That statistic frames Sheffield underachievement as a football city, with just 13 major
trophies won by its two professional clubs – United and Wednesday.
Sheffield’s links to football date back to 1857, when Sheffield FC, the oldest club
still in existence, were formed. The formulation
of the Sheffield Rules, the first codified transcription of the game’s laws, occurred
in 1860, providing Association Football with the foundation for its contemporary form.
Sheffield United, the younger club, were Formed in March 1899 by Sir Charles
Clegg, president of the local cricket club, primarily because The Wednesday cricket
club decided to move from Bramall Lane to a new ground at Olive Grove. Clegg
needed to create a new entity to generate income for the ground at Bramall Lane.
Nicknamed “the blades”, a reference to the city’s links with the production of
cutlery, they were originally tagged “the cutlers”,
as depicted in the club’s badge. United were admitted to the Football League in 1892,
joining the second division. They won promotion to the top flight in their first
season.
Sheffield Wednesday were founded in 1867 as an offshoot of the Wednesday
Cricket Club, so named because its membership was drawn from tradesmen whose
only day off work was Wednesday. The aim was to provide sporting activities for
members of the cricket club in the off-season, so football, an emerging and
increasingly popular sport, was chosen.
The club used the name “The Wednesday” until 1929 when they became Sheffield
Wednesday. The Wednesday were the first champions of the Football Alliance in
1889-90 and despite finishing fourth in 1892, were elected to the Football League.
Football was an important pastime for the working man in Sheffield in the late 19th
century. Sheffield itself grew dramatically during the industrial revolution. In 1801,
the population was 60,000 but 50 years later, it had risen to 161,000. Within another
50 years, the city had swollen to 451,000.
Crowds at both clubs began to grow – in 1901, United were attracting regular
crowds of 14,000 to Bramall Lane, while Wednesday averaged around 10,000 –
these figures representing a significant percentage of the local population.
The late 19th century and early 20th century was a golden time for Sheffield United.
In 1897-98, a team that included gargantuan goalkeeper Willie Foulke and England
international Ernest “Nudger” Needham won the club’s only league title to date.
They followed that by winning the FA Cup in 1899 and lifted the trophy again in
1902.
At the same time, Wednesday were also in the ascendancy, winning two league
titles in 1903 and 1904 and the FA Cup in 1907. Wednesday’s last league title dates
back to 1930, while their last major honour was the Football League Cup in 1991.
United’s last prize was the FA Cup in 1925. Sheffield’s growth peaked in the early 1950s
and its heavy industries started to decline in the 1960s. From a football perspective,
the city started to deteriorate at the end of the 1960s, when both clubs began
humiliating falls from grace. Sheffield United went down from the top division in
1968, but returned in 1971 and enjoyed a relatively successful first season back, topping
the table in the early months.
However, by 1976 they were back in the old second division. Wednesday began a
deep decline in 1970, eventually falling into the third division in 1975. By 1980, both
Sheffield clubs were in the third division and crowds had fallen to around 15,000.
United’s drop continued into the 1980s and in 1981, they were relegated to the
fourth division. Wednesday returned to the top flight in 1984 and crowds began to
grow once more. United had to wait until 1990 to rejoin the elite.
It’s often forgotten that in the last season before the inaugural Premier League,
Wednesday finished third (seven points behind champions Leeds United) and
United were ninth. Wednesday were seventh in the first two Premier years, but
United were relegated in 1994.
Sheffield United returned to the Premier in 2006, but went straight back down under
Neil Warnock, partly thanks to the Carlos Tevez saga at West Ham. Wednesday won
promotion back to the Championship in 2012, but didn’t make an impact until the
Chansiri era, going painfully close to promotion via the play-offs in 2017, only to lose
to Hull City at Wembley. United’s six-year stint in League One ended in 2017-18 and
they’ve made an excellent start to life in the Championship in 2018-19.
In 2017-18, crowds were healthy - United averaging 26,854 people and Wednesday
25,995. Their attendances were bigger than seven Premier League clubs.
Sheffield Wednesday were bought by Thai businessman Dejphon Chansiri in
January 2015, who purchased the club for £ 37.5 million. As well making money
available for players, he has also improved the training ground and Hillsborough’s
infrastructure. With the implementation of the Football League’s Profitability and
Sustainability (P&S) rules, which prohibit clubs from post losses in excess of £39m
over three years, Wednesday have encountered major difficulties. to deal with after
running up significant losses. The club suffered a “soft” transfer embargo between
April and August 2018 and, in January, Chansiri - who has put the club up for sale -
warned that the club was likely to suffer a second embargo at the end of the current
financial year.
Sheffield United are controlled by a parent company, Blades Leisure Limited, which
was previously owned by the McCabe family. In 2013, 50% of the shares were sold
to Prince Abdullah Bin Mosaad Bin Abdulaziz, a Saudi Arabian royal, for just £1 and
the promise of future investment. The ownership situation is increasingly fractious,
though. Relations between Prince Abdullah and Kevin McCabe have grown more
strained since 2017, with much of the tension attributable to disagreements over
spending. Both McCabe and the Prince have exercised options to transfer the
ownership of the club and effectively gain 100% of Sheffield United FC, but the
case is currently being adjudicated in Court, with the next development expected
sometime in May 2019.
While Wednesday are blighted by their ownership issues and remain locked in midtable
under new manager Steve Bruce,United continue to achieve in spite of them
and, at the end of February, were occupying one of the automatic promotion spots
in the Championship. Until both are returned to the top-flight, though, and each
club cures its institutional issues, Sheffield, with its rich industrial and footballing
heritage, will remain under-represented at the game’s highest level.