Sheffield United boss highlights Leeds United example in "Mickey Mouse" transfer point

Chris Wilder, the Sheffield United manager, has opened up on the challenges that the latter stages of the transfer window can pose after taking aim at the “Mickey Mouse” tactics used to try and unsettle players. Wilder highlighted the example of Jayden Bogle earlier this summer, whose head was turned by an approach from local and divisional rivals Leeds United.

With a week to go in the transfer market Wilder is hoping to keep his squad together but that won’t prevent speculation linking some of his key players with moves away, including Anel Ahmedhodzic, Gus Hamer and Oliver Arblaster. Ahmedhodzic is of interest to newly-promoted Ipswich Town and has also been linked with Wolves, while Hamer’s early-season form has attracted attention and Arblaster is being monitored by Brentford.

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Wilder is already on record to say that he would prefer the transfer window to close before the season starts but it will not do so until next Friday, by which time United will have played three Championship games. Speculation over a player’s future has become an accepted part of any transfer window but as Wilder acknowledged, footballers are “complex characters” who can be affected in different ways by transfer talk.

“They all have different mentalities, and you have to deal with that,” Wilder admitted. “There might be one player who wants to go, but a club have not met our valuation and he’s not going. So you have to deal with that mood swing and attitude swing. There are some players who just brush it off and get on with being a good footballer and professional, so you have to deal with all sorts.

“Julen Lopetegui [the Wolves boss] was talking about it this week. You have to handle, adapt and deal with it. And this is an experienced manager in Spain who has won a lot of things and he’s working in the Premier League. And he’s not happy about it. We all have to get on with it.”

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Wilder, speaking on the eve of United’s trip to Norwich City, admitted that United have received some interest in their key players of late - some of it genuine and some, he believes, designed to unsettle some of his key men via their agents and representatives. Speculation this week suggested that Vini Souza’s representatives had received contact from Fenerbahçe about a potential transfer switch while Wilder highlighted Bogle’s hastily-arranged move to Leeds as an example of the difficulties that clubs can face.

“There’s genuine stuff and then the Mickey Mouse stuff that happens,” he added. “We don’t play those games. We’re straight. If we make a bid for somebody, we go through the front door and deal with it that way. The job is hard enough to play mind games, but for some characters, it does get into them.

“I think you can look at Jayden as a prime example. As soon as the interest was there, they low-balled us straightaway and he was gone. I have to deal with it, and his team-mates have to deal with it as well. You don’t really talk about that, you talk about someone who doesn’t want to be here.

“Then you have to go through the dance to get the best price. But certainly, I’d say with the situation that if that club had not upped their offer, I’ve got an unhappy player that I am going to have to deal with. Hopefully, fingers crossed when the window shuts, they get on with being a professional footballer. For me, they should be a professional footballer right the way through and if it happens, it happens and be as good in their profession as they can be.”