Sheffield United manager Chris Wilder insisted his side’s performance against the Blues wasn’t a one-off after the Blades defeated Town 3-1 at Bramall Lane.

The South Yorkshiremen remain 17th following today’s victory with a start to the season which saw them lose their first six games in the Championship, leading to a swift exit for Ruben Selles, who had been controversially appointed as Wilder’s replacement in the summer.

Wilder says today’s win came after a difficult few days following the 1-0 defeats at Charlton, when they were reduced to nine men in the first half with those dismissals clearly still rankling, and Southampton.

“It’s been a really tough week,” he said. “And then you have one of the top sides in the division that have been in the Premier League, have been building for two or three seasons, League One and into the Championship and have done unbelievably well [coming here].

“And I’ve got to say I enjoyed watching them as well in the Premier League because they had a go, invested into the team, some really good players that they bought and it was really competitive as well.

“But we all know what happens in the Premier League and they rock into town today, possibly the toughest game, but I said beforehand maybe the best game we could have as a club.

“Speaking to Dara O’Shea afterwards and he said it was a really competitive game, both teams stuck it on the line for each other, tried to play both teams as well, and I think he said something like, ‘maybe, I’m not being negative, if you’d done that for a little bit more of the time, then you might be up there’. Yeah, we would have been!

“Because this isn’t just a one-off, this performance, I don’t want it to be classed as Ipswich rolled into town as one of the top sides in the division. And rightly so, fantastic manager, real good players at Championship level that have gone and played in the Premier League, [Anis] Mehmeti in this week, a good player.

“Seen the bench, seen the players that they’ve got, but I would be really disappointed with the thought that [this is a one-off], this has been us for [most of the season]. A couple of times we’ve let ourselves down, the West Brom game, the Wrexham game, but this has been pretty much us right the way through.

“We should have more points than we’re on. Our performances have been better than results but today we had to marry a big performance with a big result and we’ve managed to find that.”

Reflecting on the game, he added: “Another three goals at home, great. The way we played, we didn’t sit back at half-time, we went after it.

“Bit edgy first five, 10 or 15 minutes but as soon as we got our noses in front, I thought it was a really good game of football, both teams trying to play. Both teams trying to win a game of football and we’ve managed to win one.”

On the head injury sustained by first goalscorer Callum O’Hare when he collided with Christian Walton, Wilder said: “Just yet again, the consistency of everything. The boy [Azor Matusiwa] pushes Callum into the goalkeeper, the goalkeeper comes flying out with his foot and basically catches Callum around the head.

“He didn’t boot himself in the head, he’s cut his head on the goalkeeper’s boot. We had two sent off last week. I still don’t think that [was warranted]. Anyway, I don’t want to get into it.”

Regarding Patrick Bamford’s sending off for a second bookable offence for diving, the first having come for kicking an advertising hoarding in frustration, he continued: “I thought he’d gone around the goalkeeper, you always think it comes out at pace. There’s contact.

“I’ve not had a chance to speak to Pat, but he’s right there. We had one on the far side in the first half as well, so if he [referee Tom Nield] thought Pat had dived, and he booked him, and felt Femi [Seriki] had dived, why didn’t he book Femi? But, there it is.

“It’s going to be a miss because I thought Pat was great for us. We’ve got a free week and obviously its a huge game. I watched Millwall today, they’ve had an outstanding season under Alex [Neil], are going great.

“It’s another tough game. We’ve got some tough games coming up, so I’m delighted with the resilience of the group. It’s been stuck on us a little bit, in and around the club.

“All you have to do is do what they’ve done today and produce performances, individually and as a team to quieten the noise.”

Despite today’s result, Wilder believes Town will go on to win promotion: “They’ll push themselves back into the Premier League, in my opinion.

“I’m not putting any pressure on just because we won today. I do believe they’ll take this in their stride and win games of football. They’ll think that was a tough afternoon for them as well, but they’ll go well.”

Photo: TWTD