Sheffield United close in on key contract agreements as Chris Wilder addresses “uncertainty” point
Chris Wilder reveals Sheffield United contract plans with two or three deals in focus.
Sheffield United are working to tie down their best young players, with Chris Wilder hopeful that the Blades will have positive news on two or three contract situations in the coming weeks. A number of players are approaching key times in their Bramall Lane deals.
Femi Seriki is out of contract in the summer as things stand while other key men such as Harrison Burrows and Michael Cooper will enter the final 18 months of their present deals in the new year.
Wilder has held talks with chief executive Stephen Bettis and his recruitment team about which players are the priorities to try and tie down, with the club keen to protect the value of the talent they have both invested in and developed.
Seriki, Burrows, Cooper, Sydie Peck and Oliver Arblaster were among those specifically mentioned by Wilder as he sat down yesterday to meet the media ahead of tomorrow’s trip to Bristol City, with the Blades chief keen to see greater continuity at Bramall Lane after a summer of significant change.
“There are a number of players out of contract at the end of the season,” Wilder said. “Some we’ll make decisions later on, but some we need to build again. We built and then things changed.
“We’ve got to go through that again and it won’t be done in one window. But we have to tie our best players down and look after them, knowing that if a really good bid comes in then we deal with that and reinvest.
“But tying down the likes of Femi, Harrison, Michael Cooper, Sydie and Blaster and other players is really important. Those will be ongoing now between now and January. Hopefully we’ll have some good news pretty soon regarding two or three of those players.”
United have undergone a major rebuild in recent months, with Wilder referencing the scale of the turnover as he outlined the importance of creating a more settled squad.
That was necessary to satisfy squad cost ratio rules and further sales in January are not expected, although that situation may change if a significant bid is received for one of the prized assets remaining at Bramall Lane. The boss, though, insists that level of change cannot become a regular occurrence if the club are to build the consistency he wants.
Bettis insisted recently that the off-field noise surrounding United will not negatively impact players’ decisions over whether their futures are best served at Bramall Lane or elsewhere.
“I think that you'll always get a little bit of uncertainty that we've had to deal with in the summer,” Wilder added. “Players coming in and current players wanting to know what the situation is. But their job is to play football.
“Their job is to get their heads down and produce their best performances for the club. And deal with that. I think there's always going to be around football certain situations. I'm glad that everything's calmed down now and we talk about football. We talk about re-signing these young players that we've developed.
“Bringing Michael in. Bringing Harrison in. Developing the young players through.
“And if they don't go, we create assets. And if they don't go, they go on to do what's been done in the past. Players playing 200, 250, 300 league games. I think that's really important because you don't want all the time to have nine or ten coming in and nine or ten going out.
“You can't keep doing that. You can't keep doing that for consistency. To build. To get relationships. And to get that. We talked about the continuity that we're all after.
“I'll never plead for three, four and five windows to get it right. And we're always talking even after one window. Everybody's after winning games of football.
“None so more than me, by the way. But you have to take into consideration that we are building again. Building a mentality which I thought was really good [in defeat to Portsmouth on Wednesday night.]
“A personality that was good. I'm working on the stuff that's going to make us a team that I'm sure can be really competitive. Be competitive now, but even more so going forward.”