Oli McBurnie opens up on relationship with Sheffield United boss after being backed to hit 10 goals

“He always likes to bring up Arsenal at home in the first year,” McBurnie revealed. “He said to me: ‘You were running, you were smashing centre-halves, you were a nightmare for them ... and then at the weekend you were s***. You didn’t look like the same player.’

“He’s on my case all the time. Even when he was U23s manager, even when he was working at other clubs, we always kept in contact. He’d be the first to ring me up and hammer me.

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“He knows that to be on me is the best way to get the best out of me.

“There will be mornings in training where, if I’m quiet he knows I’ll be trying to have a chilled day and not be at it. He’ll be in the warm-up saying to me: ‘I can’t hear you; you’re going to have a down day!’ But not on his watch.”

Two dads

McBurnie and Heckingbottom first crossed paths at Barnsley, when the latter signed the former on loan only to join Leeds United a short while later. But the two remain close, with McBurnie adding with a smile that having Heckingbottom as a manager is like “having two dads”.

“I think I do need it, though,” the £20m frontman admitted.

“I can coast through sometimes. The way the gaffer wants to play is front-foot all the time and to be able to play like that, you need to be at it every single day in training.

“At first I was thinking: ‘Why is he on me? Leave me alone!’

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“But I quickly realised if he’s not on you, that’s when you need to worry. He’s on you because he cares.”

Heckingbottom showed his faith in McBurnie, who hasn’t scored a league goal for the Blades since 2020, by selecting him to start their 3-0 win over Blackburn Rovers last weekend and was rewarded with an industrious display that was unlucky not to be capped with a goal, as the former Swansea striker was denied three times by either goalkeeper or defender.

A good headache to have

Heckingbottom insisted afterwards that McBurnie is capable of scoring double figures for the Blades, providing he stays fit enough to play regularly following a torrid time with Covid-19, tonsilitis and then a stress fracture to his foot.

“I would put my house on [McBurnie reaching 10] but it’s the minutes,” Heckingbottom said.

“I can’t guarantee him games, he has got to go and get them. If I could guarantee he would play every game he would get well into double figures but we have a lot of other good players who also play in his position.

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“If we can get them all to that level, and fit and firing, it gives me that headache. But it’s a good one to have.”

McBurnie will hope to have done enough to keep his place in the starting XI this Friday evening when United travel to Luton Town, with Iliman Ndiaye staking a claim with two goals off the bench in the victory over Blackburn which sent United top of the early Championship table.

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