Sheffield United: Paul Heckingbottom makes an admission about momentum and the promotion race
Sheffield United must look to regather momentum in their pursuit of promotion after Paul Heckingbottom admitted it had “inevitably” been lost following a series of postponements.
United play only the second Championship game since December 20 when they visit Preston North End tomorrow, having suffered a first league defeat under Heckingbottom at Derby County on Saturday.
That result saw United slip to 14th in the table, 10 points behind sixth-placed Middlesbrough. However, they boast three games in hand on Chris Wilder’s side with games against them, Hull City, Queens Park Rangers and their latest opponents all being rescheduled over Christmas and New Year.
Heckingbottom, who boasted an unblemished record in permanent charge of United before the loss to County, said: “You can’t go that length of time and keep momentum. The nature of that period wasn’t great.
“It's like starting again. We have 23 games, half a season left, and we want it to be better than the first half of the season. I think it was unavoidable, the momentum, because of what happened.”
After being granted the all-clear to return to Bramall Lane after testing positive for Covid-19 last week, Heckingbottom admitted he was “disappointed” by United’s performance in the east Midlands.
With his squad set to contest at least 10 fixtures between now and the end of next month, Heckingbottom remains confident they can force themselves back into the top six reckoning - despite his misgivings about events at Pride Park.
“They’d rather be playing,” he said. “We’ll try and get everyone up to speed as quickly as possible because we need them back.”
