Chris Wilder's fears for Sheffield United and the Premier League after Covid-19 outbreak

Expressing fears that English football is facing a perilous situation following a rise in cases throughout all four divisions, Wilder confirmed he did not ask for the match, which saw United slip to their 14th defeat of the season, to be postponed.

Predicting the latest wave of the pandemic could cause more disruption than earlier this year, when the fixture schedule was halted for a three month period, Wilder told The Star: “It will, the Covid, affect us and I think this is the start of something. There’s five or six of the backroom staff and some players. It’s a little bit different for us to last year, when we had the perfect storm of everything going right, and now it seems everything is against us.”

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“There was a number of players (who tested positive) and then there was one who had to go for a test on the morning of the game because he was showing signs,” Wilder, who led United to a ninth placed finish last term, continued. “The numbers are going up and are saying it’s going to be tougher.

“The Premier League will do its best to keep going. Nobody wants the season to be canned. We don’t want that chucking at us because of the situation we are in. All the numbers are suggesting its going to get worse. It could affect us more. It’s taking its toll on the English Football League and we, in the Premier League, are doing our best, with twice a week testing now, to get out there.”

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United remain without a win this term after Ben Mee scored the only goal of the game during the first-half of a contest which saw them enjoy plenty of possession and field position but fail to trouble Nick Pope.

Insisting his team “are still fighting”, Wilder admitted the impact of the positive tests could have been “a lot worse” had another player, who he also declined to identify, not returned a negative result.

“We didn’t ask for the game to be called off,” Wilder said. “The Premier League know all of the positive tests straight away and they knew we possibly had a situation this morning. One of the players who had to go and get tested after showing signs had been in contact with lots of others and, if he had been positive, that would have wiped the team out. We’ve lost two or three players and lots of staff. It’s not the fault of the club or the process.”