Relegation

Sheffield United boss Chris Wilder has said the prospect of relegating their cross-city rivals is “not in his thought process at all”.

The Blades fan, who is unbeaten in his seven games against the Owls, said he disagreed with the notion that his side, who are 15th in the table, should cruise to a win.

“We’ll have done more preparation on this game than we have on any game this season and all the games other than the play-off final last season,” he told BBC Radio Sheffield.

“I’ve got complete respect for Henrik and a group of players… there’s talk of it being a mismatch or a gimme, whether it’s bookies’ odds or the narrative in the city… football just doesn’t work like that.

“The players have to play with a discipline and a control to win a game of football, to win a local derby.”

Wilder added: “We put a slide up about Macclesfield v Crystal Palace and Bodo/Glimt v Manchester City. There are all sorts of examples recently, let alone [in] the 100 years plus of football, the game isn’t decided on team sheets.

“We understand it’s basically their season on the line, we’re not daft. But we’ve got our fight, and ours has to be bigger than theirs.”

Nottingham Forest have sacked Sean Dyche as head coach after less than four months in charge and are looking for their fourth boss of the season.

Forest were held to a goalless draw at home by bottom club Wolves on Wednesday and are just three points above the Premier League relegation zone with 12 games remaining.

Dyche, 54, succeeded Ange Postecoglou in October and had signed a contract until the summer of 2027.

“Nottingham Forest Football Club can confirm that Sean Dyche has been relieved of his duties as head coach,” a statement read.

“We would like to thank Sean and his staff for their efforts during their time at the Club and we wish them the best of luck for the future. We will be making no further comment at this time.”

Forest, meanwhile, have won just two of their past nine Premier League games.

Crucially, one of those was a 2-1 victory at West Ham last month, which kept the Hammers from moving one point behind.

And, even when Nuno Espirito Santo’s side beat Sunderland two weeks ago, Forest reacted with an impressive 2-0 win at Brentford 24 hours later.

Those results were achieved, however, with a first-choice defence – and the absence of Matz Sels with a groin injury has been a huge loss too.

It was a gamble to replace last season’s joint Golden Glove winner with John Victor in December and one which ultimately backfired, with Victor himself now also sidelined for the rest of the campaign.

That prompted Forest to bring in Stefan Ortega from Manchester City during the transfer window – but his debut against Leeds meant a defence which was so consistent last season was only changed further.

Zach Abbott was another debutant at Elland Road, the 19-year-old making his first Premier League appearance in the absence of injured defender Murillo.

Abbott was targeted in the first half as Leeds seized on his inexperience – although Leeds‘ goals were ultimately down to a collective failure.

As much as the mood has undoubtedly improved this season, the root causes of Cardiff’s recent troubles have not simply disappeared.

Tan remains a divisive figure, as do chairman Mehmet Dalman and chief executive Ken Choo.

They were the target of numerous protests last season, some of which saw hordes of supporters marching to Cardiff City Stadium, holding banners and singing songs demanding that Tan and his fellow board members leave.

Some of the ill feeling can be traced back to Tan’s highly controversial rebranding of the club’s colours from red to blue in 2012, even though he reversed the decision three years later.

More recently, the anger relates to his perceived lack of interest, with Tan having not attended a home game for more than two years.

Then, perhaps most damningly, there is the way he, Dalman and Choo have run the club.

Fans, former players and pundits have all highlighted the startling lack of football knowledge at board level, with no layer of expertise between Tan and the many managers he has hired and fired.

Cardiff at least tried a new method in their appointment of Barry-Murphy, forming a one-off sub-committee which included the club’s academy manager Gavin Chesterfield, former Swansea City sporting director Mark Allen and members of the Wasserman agency. However, the final decision still belonged to Tan.

“They didn’t plan to get relegated,” says Perry. “And in hiring Barry-Murphy, is it really a thorough process that we’ve got to the outcome of getting him? I don’t think so.

“It’s a filtering system, a few people narrowing it down to five choices, and those five choices go then to the owner.

“The problem will always be the owner, simply because he hasn’t got that knowledge to pick out of those five. Nathan Jones was in there [on the shortlist], there were others who weren’t similar to Barry-Murphy.

“I’ll only start calling it a process if Barry-Murphy goes and the next appointment is very similar. Then it becomes a process, get another coach who puts a team out that we can identify with as supporters and is also successful.

“But you must have knowledge of what you’re looking for. The same problems are here at this club, and they need to change for us to have success continuously.”

Given how well the Barry-Murphy appointment has gone so far, then, might Tan be convinced to use a director of football or similar on a permanent basis?

“The total opposite,” Perry says. “I think he’ll get carried away, so much so that it will reinforce his own opinion of himself, that he is the right man because of what we’re seeing now.

“He will not look at the process and put his hands up and go, ‘possibly we’re fortunate here because it wasn’t our first choice’.

“You have to be honest, reflection is a key part of football or any big business, but when you reflect you have to be honest and you have to look at your skillset. Then you have to either improve that skillset or you bring somebody in that has those skills. Unfortunately, at City we don’t have that and that is my concern.”

There is no guarantee of an instant return to the Championship. It took Cardiff 18 years to get back to that level when they were last relegated to the third tier in 1985.

Of the 30 teams to have been in the Premier League and relegated to League One, six have never made it back to the Championship.

Given how Cardiff are going this season, they should not add to that number.

Promotion will not fix everything, though.

“I came into this season determined to enjoy it,” says Perry.

“We’re doing well, playing a brand that we identify with and everybody’s happy.

“But you’ve only got to look around the football club and I still see the same mistakes.”