Sheffield United’s Wrexham tunnel fracas, Billy Sharp jibe among highlights of Blades documentary

The Championship promotion chasers and the National League giants began something of an unlikely rivalry after two ill-tempered FA Cup clashes. Much of the focus beforehand was placed on the Welsh side after their Hollywood takeover by Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney and after an entertaining 3-3 draw at the Racecourse Ground, a replay at Bramall Lane saw the Blades prevail 3-1.

Paul Mullin, the Wrexham forward, scored one penalty and missed another before late goals from Billy Sharp and Sander Berge sealed United’s passage on their way to the semi-finals. United had been irked by what some felt was a lack of respect from Wrexham in the build-up to the game, the winners of which would have faced Tottenham Hotspur in the next round.

Wrexham’s media team stoked the fire by posting a tweet showing some of their players doing Son’s camera celebration, tagging in Sharp, with Anel Ahmedhodzic admitting he wanted to “shut them up” and more than one of his Blades teammates privately suggesting that their counterparts had become a little bit ‘big time’ since their Hollywood takeover and subsequent Disney documentary.

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A clearly fired-up Sharp celebrated in front of the travelling fans at full-time by rubbing his eyes with mock tears, clashing with Wrexham boss Phil Parkinson before winding up his players in the tunnel by imploring them to “Stick that on your documentary.”

A few more choice words sparked a bit of a melee that was captured by United’s cameras and included on their excellent ‘Out Run. Out Fight. Out Play’ documentary, which tells the story of their 2022/23 promotion season from the Championship. The production features insight from manager Paul Heckingbottom and a number of his players, including midfielder Ollie Norwood.

“Their manager [Parkinson] got a little bit upset, talking about the way we behaved,” Norwood said of the post-match Wrexham scenes. “But we felt they should gave been a little bit more respectful towards us. It was all macho “We’re better than you,” “Put it on your Disney programme,” sort of stuff.

“We just couldn’t lose that game, we’d have never heard the end of it. As professionals we’ve got pride and you don’t want a team from lower down, no matter the budget or what they’ve got, to beat you. A few choice words were said but I know a couple of their lads and there were no hard feelings.”

The documentary offers a fascinating insight into United’s entire promotion season, which also included an FA Cup semi-final appearance against Manchester City at Wembley. United gave a good account of themselves for large parts of the game but were beaten 3-0 thanks to Riyad Mahrez’s hat-trick, with boss Heckingbottom summing up his winning mentality by admitting his disappointment at losing to the eventual treble-winners and pointing to two “critical errors” that contributed to defeat against the eventual treble winners.

United overcame the disappointment by sealing promotion to the Premier League just days later, beating West Bromwich Albion at a raucous Bramall Lane.