It’s cliché to say, but 25 minutes is a long time in football, and that’s all it took for the feeling around Sheffield United’s performance vs. Derby on Saturday to go from one of misery, staring at a wholly deserved defeat, to being mightily disappointed at only securing a point.
The Blades were booed off at HT and looked poor until Dion Sanderson’s sending off and Romelle Donovan’s introduction, but began to create chances en masse and would’ve taken all three points if not for some good goalkeeping.
Michael Cooper - 6
Made a really excellent save to deny a Bobby Clark effort that looked destined for the bottom corner not long before Derby scored.
Hamza Choudhury - 4
Derby’s goal came down his side and he had a few other moments where he struggled defensively.
Japhet Tanganga - 5
Had one of the most frustrating moments of the game when he knocked it out of play with United playing some decent stuff, and it wasn’t his only wayward action on the ball, though he defended fairly well.
Liam Kitching - 5
Was pretty much our main progressor of the ball at 11v11 which, while he does have the passing range, doesn’t look like a massively successful strategy.
Harrison Burrows - 5
Solid enough performance where he offered some threat with his crossing, despite not really having a huge impact.
Kalvin Phillips - 5
Thought he was a little bit off the pace in the first half, as it seemed Derby’s midfield were first to most stuff that dropped, but he was much more comfortable when he was able to dictate play with waves of possession against 10 men.
Ollie Arblaster - 4
Didn’t really do all that much wrong when he was on the ball, but that was far too infrequent for a central midfielder.
Tahith Chong - 5
Had an excellent moment where he sprinted back to make an important defensive intervention, but maybe questions could be asked about why he was unable to get to Campbell’s ball across the box near the end, which would’ve given him a tap-in.
Ben Brereton-Diaz - 4
Made way after 67 mins and ended up with fewer touches of the ball than Donovan, who replaced him. Never really got going in the game.
Tom Cannon - 4
Pretty much anonymous, with almost no impact on our play.
Patrick Bamford - 6
Soldiered on after busting his shoulder in the first half and then chucked himself at a cross to score, which saw him go down again. He was also pretty quiet for the most part, but deserves credit for getting the goal.
Subs:
Romelle Donovan - 7 & Femi Seriki - 7
Both came on and changed the game. Of course they were helped by the game state they came into, but they were at the heart of almost every chance we created towards the end and both made a pretty good case to be in the starting XI next time out.
Average rating - 5.15
Ratings system:
0 – Reserved for anyone who has a wayward effort at goal smash me in the face, unlikely to ever happen.
1 – Worst of the worst. Saved for disastrous performances, with result-altering mistakes.
2 – A terrible performance. Performances where a player offers very little and has many unsuccessful actions, ultimately proving to be a major detriment to the team’s overall performance.
3 – A bad performance. Negative contribution. Like a 2, just a bit less rubbish.
4 – A below-average performance. Not necessarily having a negative impact on the game; it could just be a player who struggled to impact the game at all.
5 – The baseline rating. All players go into a game starting on a 5 — it’s bang average, given out for an unremarkable yet solid performance, for a postman delivering the post.
6 – A decent performance. A player who gets a 6 has positively contributed to the game, and at the very least has had some impressive moments while being generally solid outside of them.
7 – A good performance. Awarded for players who had a noticeable positive impact on the game.
8 – A very good performance. A player who made significant contributions to the outcome of the game with their performance and consistently displayed a high level throughout.
9 – An outstanding performance. To score as high as a 9, a player needs to be dominant throughout the match, performing at a level well above the standard and/or making multiple game-changing contributions.
10 – A perfect 10, unlikely to ever see the light of day as nobody has a flawless game. For me to even think about giving out a 10 it would probably have to be a player doing something historic or unheard of.