How can Sheffield United establish themselves in Premier League without falling into Nottingham Forest trap?

After the latest blow to their survival hopes only increased the possibility of playing Championship football next season, one of the many pressing questions facing Sheffield United is what happens next. Defeat at Wolves on Sunday saw them fall eight points adrift of safety and that margin became 11 a day later, when Everton's 10-point deduction was reduced to six on appeal.

United's awful goal difference means that they are effectively 12 points adrift of fourth-bottom Nottingham Forest, with the same number of Premier League games remaining in which to enact the mother of all turnarounds. Their hopes may be boosted by the threat of points deductions for Forest and Everton, who have been hit with a second Premier League charge for breaching top-flight spending rules, but the reality is that United cannot currently consistently compete in the Premier League, either in the bootroom or in the boardroom.

Hecky verdict on United survival hope as "fragile" mentality detailed

Owner Prince Abdullah does not have the capability or the inclination to fund United to the tune of many of their top-flight contemporaries and their squad is underequipped at this level too. At the start of the season Paul Heckingbottom was sent to war with a water pistol and spread his initial £20m budget thinly, with a focus on quantity rather than quality. Two loan players and a new goalkeeper for Chris Wilder in January were always unlikely to redress the balance.

So now United and their hierarchy have a decision to make. Clubs such as Brighton and Brentford are undoubtedly the poster-boys to try and emulate; neither are bigger clubs than United, in the most basic sense but have invested heavily in infrastructure and have a clearly-identified path. Brentford have struggled without Ivan Toney this season - who wouldn't? - but are light years ahead of United off the pitch. Brighton are in another stratosphere.

United clearly aren't at that level and can't afford to close the gap and so may, to put it bluntly, have to accept their status as something of a yo-yo club. It was a strategy employed by Norwich for a while but they showed that it has a shelf-life and even then so many good decisions have to be made to avoid the risk of squandering so much good work. Recruitment would be a good start; Brighton have enjoyed great success in the transfer market, recruiting to a clearly-identified style of play. Brentford could lose Ivan Toney this summer and have already replaced him, signing £30m Igor Thiago from Club Brugge to get ahead of the game.

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Banging on about the departures of Sander Berge and Iliman Ndiaye at this stage risks sounding like a broken record but the effect of their sales was seismic. Heckingbottom admitted today that the the mentality of the group they left behind at Bramall Lane was "fragile" and United were left scrambling for replacements just before the start of the season.

Gus Hamer arrived quickly as Berge's replacement but it took time to work out exactly where he fits in, with some fans still unsure. Replacing Ndiaye took almost four weeks before Cameron Archer arrived; again a different profile of player and on a glorified loan deal with an arrangement to return to Aston Villa if United went down this season. Rather than recruit players to fit their style, Heckingbottom was forced to change his style to fit the players he was able to recruit.

Speaking this morning on Talksport, Heckingbottom was asked if the mechanics of the Premier League's finances essentially meant that clubs such as United simply cannot hope to compete. "Yeah," he agreed. "Unless you take a real, real long-term plan and accept you may be a yo-yo club for a little bit until you become established. In that time, a five or 10-year plan, you have to get so many things right because one bad decision can undermine three or four years of good work.

"It's tough but teams have shown it can be done. Look at Brentford and Brighton. But it is the money. Brighton have got so many things right, infrastructure-wise but they've invested so much in young players who we'll never see. Millions and millions in players they'll move on, for the one or two who get in. And the one thing they do great is set the price very high, the bar very high.

Spot a Unitedite you know in these 18 brilliant fan photos from Wolves "I think they're good examples. Their infrastructure off the pitch is great and they've invested a lot of money in recruitment and how they identify staff and players. But they've still had little yo-yo moments, especially Brighton. So you have to take a long-term view. Forest took a short-term view and may be punished for that so the only way out is to take a long-term view.

"Burnley may have done it, Vincent Kompany gets criticised sometimes for the way he's playing but that may be their long-term view. They've stuck with the manager, they've signed a lot of young talent who play this way and they may come back down and go back up and be stronger for it if they've identified their way of playing. Luton have done the same but playing in a different style, but recruited to play that style. That's the only way out because you're not suddenly going to have the financial clout to compete. So you have to have a strategy."

"The owner threw all the money they had at it to try and stay up and it looks like they're going to be punished for it," Heckingbottom added on Forest, who face a hearing next week which could have big ramifications for the Premier League survival race. "The precedent has been set now with Everton, it's still a big punishment of six points when you're down at the bottom. We know the rules but the problem is the Premier League clubs voted them in. And if they want to amend them, they have to vote to amend them."