When does a stutter become a stumble? After a first home defeat of the season against Burnley on Boxing Day, the Championship leaders Sheffield United dropped two more home points against West Bromwich Albion.
Perhaps we should not overreact and Chris Wilder has been around long enough not to, but with a trip to promotion rivals Sunderland up next on New Year’s Day, this is shaping to be an uncomfortable period for his blunted Blades.
An equaliser from Karlan Grant in first-half added time cancelled out Andre Brooks’s opener and secured for West Brom a deserved point.
The Blades are being stretched by injuries – their bench had a kids’ club feel to it. With the takeover by COH Sports complete, Wilder met the club’s new American owners last week and spelled out his desire for a couple of experienced additions to his squad in the January transfer window.
The impregnable defensive edifice that went nine games at Bramall Lane without coughing up a goal has now been breached three times in three days. Without the injured Harry Souttar as its chief pillar, it looked less commanding against a tricky West Brom side still with designs on promotion themselves.
Searching for a new manager after the destabilising mid-season exit of Carlos Corberan to Valencia, it was a fine point on one of the Championship’s more testing road trips. Chris Brunt, in charge on a caretaker basis, could be well satisfied.
Wilder initially shelved the experiment of pairing Kieffer Moore and Rhian Brewster up front after the partnership spluttered against Burnley on Boxing Day.
Instead, Moore was deployed as the lone striker, with Brewster on the bench. The Wales targetman spent the afternoon involved in a running battle with the West Brom captain, Kyle Bartley, with both men needing treatment on separate occasions after coming out on the wrong side of the rough-and-tumble contest.
Moore should have done better early on after a mistake from the West Brom full-back Callum Styles but fluffed his near-post shot. Styles made a more positive contribution at the other end with a driving run and long-range strike that brought a first involvement for the Sheffield United goalkeeper Michael Cooper.
For the most part, though, it was the home side making the running and the visitors attempting to pick them off on the break.
Brooks gave Sheffield United the lead in the 23rd minute after a lovely interchange with Callum O’Hare. Brooks cashed in on some poor control from Ousmane Diakite to pick up possession on the edge of the West Brom penalty area, passed to O’Hare, who returned the favour with a first-time backheel for the midfielder to drill his shot past Alex Palmer in the West Brom goal for his first senior goal.
Tom Fellows wasted an inviting opportunity in the 32nd minute, holding his head in his hands after volleying over from close range as Cooper palmed a cross-shot from Grant into his path. At the other end Moore’s looping header splashed down just over the bar after a well-worked free-kick drill delivered by Gustavo Hamer.
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Grant’s equaliser, when it came, was instinctive and precise. Wearing his second shirt of the game after a nose bleed induced by a stray arm by Tom Davies, he thumped home a first-time strike from outside the penalty area after Mikey Johnston’s shot had ricocheted into his path.
With West Brom starting the second half the brighter, Grant threatened again with a powerful shot on the spin but Cooper was able to beat it away.
The Sheffield United coaching staff were on their feet in the 63rd minute appealing for a penalty after Alfie Gilchrist’s shot struck the arm of Torbjørn Heggem but referee Stuart Attwell was not interested, presumably because of the proximity of the West Brom defender. There was another appeal nine minutes later as O’Hare was blocked off in the area and sent sprawling by Diakite but again it was waved away.
The glacial pace with which top scorer Josh Maja left the pitch when he was substituted with 10 minutes left gave away West Brom’s satisfaction with a share of the spoils but that did not prevent Jed Wallace testing Cooper with a dipping free-kick.
Brewster was brought on for the closing stages alongside Moore as the Blades went for broke but he made a horrible hash of a great chance with four minutes left, slicing wide Davies’s cross from inside the six-yard box. Heggem went sprawling in the Blades box in added time but West Brom had no luck with Attwell, either.
Source: theguardian.com
