Sheffield United boss Chris Wilder appreciates the support he has had from the club’s owner but has no doubt results have not been good enough and says the Blades must “deliver”.
Wilder’s men are bottom of the Premier League with just one point from 12 games, their 11th loss and seventh in a row coming when they were beaten 3-0 at Southampton on Sunday.
The match was attended by the Bramall Lane outfit’s owner Prince Abdullah, who told BBC Radio Sheffield he will “stick with Chris no matter what”.
He also said: “If he wasn’t manager of a team right now, I would hire him and if the worst comes to the worst he would be the manager to take us back to the Premier League.”
Ahead of Thursday’s home clash with Manchester United, Wilder was asked about the owner’s comments, and about 19th-placed West Brom sacking head coach Slaven Bilic.
Wilder said: “I’m obviously just disappointed for Slav, who is a really good guy and a good football man, but this is the nature of the game, and obviously the game moves on.
“The situation with managers is always going to be speculation, and I’m not precious or arrogant enough to think, with the run we’re on, there might (not) be talk regarding my situation.
“(I’m) not precious enough or arrogant enough (not) to know the results from us all so far at this club – and I have to take full responsibility for that – have not been good enough.
“For the owner to come out and say (what he did), I appreciate that, but my full focus is trying to turn around the results.
“I have (something) to get on with, which is something I personally have not done as well as I should have, and the players have not done as well as they should, which is getting results for this club.”
He added: “It’s quite easy for me to talk about it and for players too, but they have to go and deliver and we haven’t delivered enough times.
“We have to deliver – the players have to and I have to try to deliver in the things I can affect and control.
“We have to deliver those full-blooded, fire-in-the-belly (performances), to show what we are about as a football club.”
Wilder also spoke of the “street fighter” in him as his team battle for survival.
“We, I, the club, the players will come through this period,” he said.
“We want that to happen sooner (rather) than later, but in that time people will talk about it and make assumptions about you and have a view and an opinion on you.
“There’s nothing you can do about it, you’ve just got to go through the process, believe in what you have done, and the street fighter in me will fight it out, and the team will, and work our way through it.”
Blades defender George Baldock has described Prince Abdullah’s comments as “music to all our ears” for the players, and the job Wilder has done at the club as “remarkable”.
And he said: “At the end of the day, we are the ones coming up short on the pitch.
“He (Wilder) has stuck with us and given us that opportunity to play Premier League football. We need to repay that faith.
“It’s great that he has the backing and (we are) fully behind him to help us get back to where we need to be.”
