7 things doomed Sheffield United need to do to recover from this horror-show of a season

When Sheffield United fans crowded into the city centre in May and gazed up at their promotion heroes on the Town Hall balcony through a haze of red smoke and optimism, little did they know the upcoming season was already doomed to failure. The club's board knew there wasn't much money in the bank; Paul Heckingbottom almost certainly knew, too, and was trying to work out how he could build a competitive team in a division awash with billionaires.

The fact was, he couldn't and lost his job as a result. Chris Wilder's return brought a slight lift but for all his obvious strengths, working miracles is not among them.

United will go down as one of the worst teams to play in the Premier League, with teams lining up to give them a hammering and really it's all been of their own doing. They recruited a Championship squad to take on some of the world's best players and sold their own two stars - Iliman Ndiaye and Sander Berge - just before the season started, thereby somehow expecting to perform at a higher level with a worse side.

For financial reasons and for the sake of the club's future it might, arguably, in the end be seen as worth the pain, though try telling those fans who have had to suffer the weekly global embarrassment. But it can't be allowed to happen again and while the people currently at the top of the club remain there, things simply have to change in how it is run.

For goodness sake, hurry up!

Transfer windows have been a shambles for years now with targets understood to have been being missed out on because things are taking far too long and second, third, fourth choices were coming in, in a fit of desperation to fill gaps in the squad. Or they finally get a deal over the line when the player could have been settled in a few weeks or months previous. It shouldn't take so long. Of course negotiating is part and parcel of transfers but consistently pushing until the last minute and over-complicating deals is a needlessly pressure-building strategy - see the start of this season for the absolute worst case scenario. Find out how much it is going to cost and pay it, or move on very early if it's implied you're getting nowhere near this one. The club is down now, all focus should now be on what's needed for next season to rebuild a squad that will almost certainly lose a lot of experience. The silver-lining to this shambles of a season is that they are now uniquely placed to have the time to get ahead of the curve on that front.

Get someone in to deal with that

Every modern day club of United's stature needs a Director of Football, or whatever you like to call it. Yes, the manager has his say, yes the board have their say around cost, but ultimately it should be someone's very particular job to zero in on potential targets and make the deals happen as quickly as possible. This is a must in terms of the recruitment strategy going forward.

Let them go

There are 17 players - including those on loan - who are out of contract at the end of this season. Many of them are perfectly capable Championship players, indeed that's where the problem lies currently. Only a handful should probably be kept on and on contracts of no more than two years - if they don't agree with that or can get better elsewhere, then they leave with everyone's best wishes. There's no room for sentiment here and some tough decisions have to be made. While we are on the subject of contracts, stop letting so many run down to the final stages! The club might feel that it puts them in control but players are human and it's surely difficult to put to the back of your mind the fact that in a few months time you'd have no idea where you are going to play, where you are going to live or where your kids are going to go to school.

Learn to sell well

Selling the family silver has been a United trait for years, but there are times when it's necessary. To use a current example, do you really think Anel Ahmedhodzic is going to sign another contract at the club? The signs indicate no, at this stage, though of course that may change. However, serious thought has to be given to selling players like him at the right time so as to get the best deal. Otherwise, in a year or so if things aren't going according to plan, he leaves for pittance or runs down his contract and goes for free. The clubs United should be looking to as purveyors of best practice - Brentford and Brighton for example - find a player, sell him on and have a list of replacements already lying in wait. There's nothing wrong with selling, if it's done right and for the right reasons.

Regain an identity

Heckingbottom's promoted side had an identity in how they played, though it was largely based around Iliman Ndiaye and tweaking that which Wilder had so successfully implemented, frankly because the squad had been built to play that way and there was very little else he could do. There needs to be a refresh. This season doesn't really count - we don't know how they are supposed to play from one week to the next because they are simply trying, unsuccessfully, to get by without taking another battering. A new strategy is needed, largely based around the best of the young players coming through. It's very early days in their respective careers but Andre Brooks, Oli Arblaster, Femi Seriki, Will Osula and Daniel Jebbison have the ability to form the basis of United's team for the next five years at least, or create a transfer kitty that can help fund the next batch coming through. That is where the spotlight should point in terms of how the team is going to play over the course of the next few years. 

Don't get hung up on promotion for now

This one probably doesn't sit well with everyone because it screams lack of ambition, but there's a reset needed and one season in the Championship almost certainly won't be enough. The fear is that they just end up in the same position as this season; not ready to compete in a division where the gulf between the top and bottom is growing unsustainably. Admittedly it's a risk, because you could end up spending too long there and before you know it, you're fighting off dropping into League One, like Stoke City are now a few years after theri relegation from the top flight. That said, if a takeover happens, major investment is secured and the recruitment strategy is right then perhaps they can make a fist of it, but there's nothing to indicate that's going to happen any time soon.

Change the terms of a takeover

Few people reading this, and the one writing it, knows what goes into selling, or even trying to sell a football club. The biggest thing the majority of us will flog in our lives is a house and that in itself is a pain in the backside. So there is SOME sympathy with the fact that despite being available to buyers for quite some time now, United have attracted little more than tyre-kickers, frauds and narcissists. However, the frustration lies from watching other clubs of - give or take - a similar standing being bought over with relative ease. Even from the point of view of someone with no experience in these matters, it can't be this difficult, surely?

A club with Sheffield United's history and heritage, who have spent three of the past five years in the biggest league in the world, with an academy - despite lacking somewhat in resources - that is the envy of teams much higher in stature, with a strong unwavering support base and all this in the city that gave football to the world, still can't find a buyer? The current owners can't afford to keep running the club at the level it finds itself in, that much has been admitted and no one can be critical of that, but there has to come a point where they cut their losses and make it easier for someone else to take over. Otherwise, the successes of this recent era become little more than a whimsical period for nostalgists as the club hovers around mediocrity, at best. The supporters deserve much more than that.