With Sheffield United looking good in the Premier League and Sheffield Wednesday not looking so good in the Sky Bet Championship, well at least before the season was suspended, it may be a while until they face each other again.
That means if we want to see another Steel City Derby it’ll probably happen in the cup. This has happened a few times before, nine times before actually. The most famous time was the 1993 FA Cup Semi-Final when what seemed like the entirety of Sheffield migrated to London for the day to watch a dramatic match between the Owls and the Blades.
But if you are from Sheffield, you know that story. Chris Waddle scores with a fantastic free-kick and gets excited in the pants because of it, United strike back through Alan Cork and while Wednesday dominate, a superb performance from Alan Kelly keeps it level and forces the game until extra time. However, Mark Bright eventually scores for Wednesday and seals a historic win for them. Everyone knows that story, Wednesday fans still brag about it and United fans still try to forget about it. Let’s tell a different story.
This is when Sheffield Wednesday faced Sheffield United back in 2000.
When the draw came up, it was like bringing Christmas a bit earlier. That’s because this game had not happened competitive since 1994 when Wednesday beat United 3-1 on the way for the Blades to be relegated. They had faced each other in a friendly tournament called the Steel City Challenge Trophy a few times but let’s face it, that didn’t really matter.
But while the cup draw was a surprise, the two teams were scheduled to face each other. That’s because Wednesday had been relegated from the Premier League that year and the Steel City derby was going to happen on the 16th December. But this draw meant the game was going to happen a month earlier than scheduled.
For the match, Wednesday decided to look to many of their academy players. Steven Haslam, Aaron Lescott, Ritchie Humphreys and Matt Hamshaw all started with Tony Crane and Derek Geary coming on as substitutes later on in the match. Not many players remained from the Premier League era, though Gerald Sibon would lead the line with loan signing Efan Ekoku.
For United, they had a team of players that were club legends and ones that would soon be club legends. Simon Tracey and Keith Curle would be in net and defence respectively, while the likes of Nick Montgomery and Michael Brown held the midfield together.
In an interesting twist, the game would follow a very similar narrative to the 1993 FA Cup Semi-Final. Early on, Ekoku earned a free kick on the left. Owen Morrison whipped the ball in and the Nigerian international was able to flick the ball on and past Tracey for the opener, becoming the first man to score in a competitive Steel City derby since Dane Whitehouse.
United then got the equaliser before the half was done. Montgomery got the ball on the right and played a fantastic ball to the centre of the box with the entirety of the Wednesday defence being baffled by it. Michael Brown ran onto the ball and finished before Kevin Pressman got there, and it was all level. That combination of Brown and Montgomery would be a pain for Wednesday for a few more years.
Despite having the majority of the chances, certainly enough to win the game, Wednesday weren’t able to take back the lead in regular time and the game was forced into extra time. So after getting an extra, earlier than expected Steel City Derby, fans would even get an extra thirty minutes. What luck for the fans!
And in this far less important remake of the 1993 FA Cup Semi-Final, the same end result happened. In the 113rd minute, Morrison put a fantastic looping cross into the box and at the far post, Ekoku headed into the ground where it took a lucky bounce and went into the net. This was enough for Wednesday to win and get into the next round of the cup.
While Wednesday would win this battle, they wouldn’t win the war of Sheffield. That December match between the Owls and Blades would finish 1-1, with an Ian Hendon goal canceling out Bobby Ford’s opener for United. The Blades did get revenge that season by coming back to Hillsborough on April Fools Day to win 2-1, with the goals coming from Laurent D’Jaffo and Carl Asaba.
From this season, United would only get better while Wednesday worse. Under Neil Warnock, United would consistently challenge for promotion until finally getting it in 2006. Wednesday though would drop down the league and be relegated to what was then called Division 2 in 2003.
Of course, the two teams have had plenty of dramatic encounters over this millennium. Both sides have had doubles other each other, both have had incredible wins that will stay with the fans for a long time. But it all kicked off again with Efan Ekoku and Owen Morrison being a potent combination, which is a very weird sentence to write.
