How Chris Wilder showed he was going to do things his way from day one at Sheffield United

The United he had inherited from Nigel Adkins bore no resemblance to the club that Wilder had grown up supporting and later represented as a player. As United slumped to 11th in League One, Wilder's Northampton Town were crowned champions of the division below but his heart was never far from the Steel City.

Northampton's staff Christmas Do that season saw Wilder borrow a box at Bramall Lane to watch United play Coventry. The game was so dull that the Cobblers party left at half time and went to the Railway pub across the road instead.

Wilder had seen enough. His predecessor had, at considerable expense, decorated Bramall Lane's tunnel and changing room area with a number of motivational signs and posters, which became the first casualty of the Wilder era. The new manager couldn't wait for them to be taken down by a workman, so obliged himself.

Wilder renegotiated the deal goalkeeper George Long had been offered by Adkins and released 10 other players as he looked to put his own stamp on S2, and bring back the power to the club which he felt had been surrendered to players and agents.

Mark Duffy, one of his earliest signings in the job, played for a Burton side that won 1-0 at Bramall Lane in the Adkins season and told Wilder that he couldn't believe how easy it was.

"I think some United players came off the pitch buzzing that it was only 1-0, and this was against Burton Albion - who, with no disrespect, were a Conference club six years earlier," Duffy said.

"I remember thinking ‘wow, how far has this club fallen?’

"The standards had dropped so far from what I knew of coming to Bramall Lane. Basically, it was just crap.”

Four years on, the Blades stand on the brink of a place in Europe; a journey that began not with a single step, but a single screw.

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