Ahead of facing his former side with current team Hull, Nigel Adkins explains what went wrong for him at Sheffield United in 2015/16.
It is less than two years since Nigel Adkins was sacked as Sheffield United manager yet so much has changed at the South Yorkshire club.
Adkins was in charge of the Blades during the 2015/16 season, guiding the team to their lowest finish since 1983 of 11th in League One – which cost him his job as boss.
The 52-year-old is preparing to face his old side for the first time since that dismissal when current club Hull City host them in the Championship this evening (February 23).
Now managed by Adkins’ successor, Chris Wilder, United are just two points off the playoffs in the second tier of English football having earned promotion last term with 100 points.
Yet the Hull boss thinks that he isn’t entirely to blame for what turned out to be a pretty disastrous campaign at Bramall Lane for the former goalkeeper.
“All sorts of things were going on behind the scenes. A lot of change. We’ve gone in there and it was a massive group of players. We started out with two out and out wingers, we played a narrow four and then we went with three at the back, which they’re very successful at now,” Adkins was quoted by the Sheffield Star.
“I went in there believing there had to be change and believing that I had time. I had a three-year contract. There was 50 players and we turned it all around. I believe I was the only manager in the January window not to sign a player, we sold everyone. I signed one player in Billy Sharp and the rest were on loan. There was a couple already lined up and they came in.”
It seems as if Adkins is distancing himself from what was a frankly terrible year for the Blades, but the way they have performed under Wilder since shows what could have been achieved.
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