Former Sheffield United boss opens up on Ched Evans saga that "derailed" promotion bid and 'cost Blades £10m'

Wilson was a controversial choice as United boss in some eyes because of his previous association with city rivals Wednesday but came close to leading the Blades back into the Championship at the first time of asking, before Evans was jailed towards the end of the season. United finished third with 90 points and lost the play-off final on penalties, spending five further painful seasons in League One before Chris Wilder arrived and took them up.

Evans spent two and a half years in prison before his conviction was quashed, and he was later found not guilty at a retrial. He later returned to United after a spell at Chesterfield – playing under Wilson - and is now at their Championship rivals Preston North End.

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Wilson addressed the Evans saga in his recently-released autobiography, I Get Knocked Down. “Ched was on fire during the 2011/12 season, scoring over 30 goals,” Wilson wrote. “On the pitch, everything was going well for him. But off it, he was fighting some very serious personal issues.

“There was a board meeting early on in my tenure to discuss how the club should handle the situation... There was a strong push to get rid of Ched. I could understand that thinking because the club didn't want the stigma that was attached to the very strong accusations, but my argument was that he hadn't been proven guilty of anything yet, and we should allow him to carry on with his life and his football until the courts decided.

"The board agreed. It was a strong decision from us all because of the potential backlash from the public. But if you believe in something, you've got to see it through. I strongly believe that you are innocent until proven guilty.”

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Evans had scored 35 times for United when his court case began and had been named in the PFA team of the year. But news filtered through of his guilty verdict when United were on their way to an away game at MK Dons. “When we arrived at the hotel, I’d never seen or heard such a quiet bunch of players,” Wilson remembered. United, perhaps unsurprisingly, lost that day and could only draw their final two league games, allowing Wednesday to pip them to the post and win promotion.

“Everyone was totally stunned,” Wilson said. “We all thought it was a foregone conclusion that Ched would be found guilty because we all believed he was innocent. Ched’s conviction completely derailed our season. Losing your top scorer is hard enough but the psychological impact his conviction had on the rest of the lads meant we lost the whole of the team. We lost our focus and drew our final two league games and with the run we’d been on, we’d have fancied our chances of winning at least one of those last three. No doubt in my mind. Ched would probably have bagged goals in all three.”

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Wilson claims he had set up a striker to come in on loan to replace Evans, but the board refused the £16,000 cost. “I couldn’t believe it,” Wilson wrote, later insisting a club would have paid £10m for Evans.

I Get Knocked Down, by Danny Wilson with Mathew Mann, is published by Morgan Lawrence, RRP £15.