Kevin Gage's Sheffield United Column: Hopefully it's not over yet - so here's my player, goal, game and moment of the Blades' season (so far)

I think I can speak for all of us Blades fans when I say we absolutely DON’T want to consign this wonderful season to history and worse still, forget it ever even happened as there have been truly magical moments over our first 28 games.

The players and the management have taken to the top flight division like ducks to water, with commentators, pundits and even opposing fans giving our team the praise they’ve so richly deserved. To be honest, if you were given the task of choosing a few memorable moments and a couple of players to highlight, you’d find it a really difficult task.

Guess what? I’ve been given it.

So, in no particular order, here are what I’m calling my ‘Season So Far’ awards:

PLAYER OF THE SSF: I can hear the calls for John Fleck already as I type this but this is not (and should never be in any season) an award just given to the ‘best’ player which is so often the case. My choice is always for the player in any season who has caught the eye the most, played out of his skin on occasions, and consistently turned in eight out of 10 performances.

All of those descriptions could actually apply to about half of our team to be fair, but for me there is only one man who deserves the award over the others. So the train overlapping at platform six is The Basham Express!

Yes, Bashambauer himself has been nothing short of sensational this season. In a defence that have all performed heroics, he’s epitomised everything that Chris Wilder and this Blades team represent - 100 per cent commitment, bravery, energy, desire, attitude, etc etc etc. And if all that wasn’t enough, we then throw in his surges forward to join in the attack, his deft flicks and tricks around the box (remember the back heel v Villa that led to the first goal?) A true Blades legend, forever. God bless HMS Basham and all who sail with her.

GOAL OF THE SSF: We don’t like Norwich anymore do we? A previously harmless friendly club from the middle-of-nowhere in Norfolk have turned into our bitter enemies and beating them away earlier in the season was very pleasing!

But we needed to beat them at home and in our last league game before the shutdown we did, courtesy of a quite brilliant goal from our skipper. We’d dominated most of the first half-hour but chances were hard to come by, but in the 36th minute, John Lundstram found himself with time and space on the right-hand side of the penalty area to whip in a vicious curling cross.

Billy Sharp had lost his marker and threw himself headfirst at the ball from about 12 yards out, making perfect contact and sending it screaming into the net before their keeper could move. World-class finishing worthy of gracing the so-called ‘best league in the world’. Who says Billy Sharp just scores tap-ins?

GAME OF THE SSF: I’m going to bend the rules a bit here, and I can because they are my awards! So I’m going to award the title to TWO matches, but against the same place in England. BOTH games against the Manchester clubs get the award here, as even though we didn’t win either game, we were superb in both.

Manchester City away first then. To go to the reigning Premier League champions and play them off the park in the first half was quite staggering. But for another marginal VAR disallowed goal we’d have gone in at half-time 1-0 up and deservedly so. Pep Guardiola had to completely re-shape his team at the interval to get them back into the second half and the deadlock was only broken when the ref accidentally impeded John Fleck, causing him to lose possession deep in our half, and City took swift advantage.

Still, we poured forward, had some great chances, and in the last few minutes Sharp’s header hit the inside of the post, bounced along the goal line and somehow stayed out! The points went to them, the plaudits went to us.

Rewind to a few weeks earlier and we’d had arguably the biggest game of our season when the mighty Manchester United rolled into town. A packed house, live on TV and after the recent performances against Liverpool and Arsenal, we knew we had nothing to fear. Once again, we were outstanding and even a hard-nosed experienced ex-pro like myself was blown away with just how damned good our football was at times.

We continually played one and two touch football round one of the worlds biggest, most expensively assembled teams. It was joyous to watch. A 1-0 lead at half-time quickly turned to 2-0 when Lys Mousset sped away and curled a super shot into the corner of David De Gea’s net. We were in dreamland.

But we had a rude awakening of course as 10 minutes later we somehow found 3-2 down! Some teams might have buckled at this stage, but as we all know these Blades are not ‘some’ team. Last few minutes, a Blades attack, Mousset digs a cross out and Oli McBurnie somehow twists his body around and volleys home! Cue scenes and limbs aplenty, curtailed by a VAR check, an agonizing wait, and then more limbs and scenes as we’d got a fully deserved point after all! What a game. What a performance. What a team.

MOMENT OF THE SSF: So it would be fair to say that we’ve had our ups and downs with VAR this season. In fact, decisions had gone against us more times than having favoured us, but we’d got one when it mattered against Man United. And then on a Friday night in January at Bramall Lane, we got the benefit of a VAR decision in virtually the final minute that resulted in celebrations after that will live with me for a long time!

If we dislike Norwich, then we really REALLY dislike West Ham, for all the well-documented historic reasons. Once again, we’d been by far the better side for all the game, but our one goal was all that separated the teams.

In the final few minutes, West Ham’s Declan Rice broke through the middle, there was a challenge from John Egan and the ball broke to the hugely irritating Robert Snodgrass who tucked the ball away. He then decided to run past the thousands of Hammers fans celebrating the equaliser in order to stand and taunt the Blades in the Tony Currie Stand.

The very last player we’d wanted to score against us had just scored against us and was now blatantly taunting us. I doubt that will be forgiven any time soon. As we held our heads in our hands, we then realised the big screen in the corner had turned purple and the words VAR CHECKING GOAL appeared.

All of a sudden, there was hope. After what seemed to be an eternity, the ref got a message in his earpiece, made that square TV shape with his hands and disallowed the goal!!!! The final whistle blew almost immediately and Bramall Lane erupted! As I made my way back into the TC Suite with the hundreds of other Blades the celebrations were as if we’d just won the FA Cup or Champions League!

Strangers were high fiving and hugging each other, and laughing at the insanity of what we’d just witnessed. It was a magical, unforgettable moment, and the irony is that it came about because of bloody VAR, which we’d all grown to hate! I still do by the way, but that discussion is for another day!

So there’s my inaugural SSF awards and much as I’ve enjoyed them I really don’t want to have to do anything like it again! Let’s hope the season can be played out to a satisfactory finish, and maybe I’ll have to change my choices if someone scores an absolute screamer of a goal, or there’s an even better game than the two Manchester ones.

Whatever happens, I’ll doubt they’ll be a better moment than the West Ham one, but as someone once said “football’s a funny old game” and this is Sheffield United FC - so don’t rule anything out!

Kevin Gage owns The Manor House bar/cafe/hotel, Dronfield. Follow him on Twitter: @gageykev

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