Good Game: The series looking at the amazing, utterly memorable, unbelievably dramatic and downright ludicrous games that involved Stevenage Borough over the years. But we’ll insist that we accept no blame for memories warped by time, age or alcohol consumption at the time. We’ll never refer to any games involving Macclesfield Town either – particularly any at Broadhall Way. Those sort of things never happened, dontcha know…
Stevenage 4-0 Sheffield United
Lamex Stadium, Stevenage — 16 March 2013 — Sky Bet League One
It’s fair to say that – with our form in the gutter and a boss under pressure – no-one saw us blowing the Blades away like this; our guests being firmly in the League One title race, while we were starting to feel the heat of relegation on the backs of our necks. When things do go wrong in a team’s season, however, it’s not unusual for a result to pop up from nowhere and go right against the grain. At the Lamex on this particular Saturday, that’s what we got.
The background
First and foremost, Boro’ and the Blades hadn’t exactly been kind to one another in the past few months. We’d borked their automatic promotion hopes by holding them to a 2-2 draw at Bramall Lane in April 2012; rivals Wednesday securing promotion themselves with that result. A few weeks later and the Blades ended our promotion hopes with a late goal in the playoffs. And then, in November 2012, we were on the receiving end of a 4-1 thrashing in Sheffield.
In terms of the season as a whole, the bigger picture was that Boro’ had gone from top of the league in autumn to 16th in spring; Gary Smith’s men coming into this one 10 points above the danger zone and enduring a run of one win in nine. For our visitors, the summit was only three points away. With a match in hand over leaders Doncaster Rovers, the Blades would’ve felt confident of winning at the Lamex – unbeaten in seven, of which only two were draws.
Stevenage 4-0 Sheffield United: The rundown
Smiffy was feeling the pressure amid our poor form. The injuries and suspensions were now mounting up too. So, we had to recall forward Dani Lopez from his loan spell at Barnet. Mind you, the Spaniard had bagged a hattrick in his most recent outing for the Bees. So, maybe it would be a genius move to put him into our line-up. Because why not? Apart from Lopez, we made three other changes to the starting XI.
We showed we meant business from the off, while our visitors had to change things up early doors due to an injury to Jamie Murphy. It wasn’t all one-way traffic and Steve Arnold had to make an acrobatic save to keep things level at one point. But the deadlock would be broken four minutes before the break; Lopez receiving a pass from Miguel Comminges, before a neat turn took him past his marker and allowed him to fire home from close range.
Boro’ doubled up early in the second half. The Blades could only clear James Dunne‘s cross as far as Gavin Mahon; the veteran midfielder dropping the ball back into the box for Lopez to pounce and slide it past the opposition goalkeeper.
All the while, the Blades – predictably – posed a threat when on their own attacks; a certain Harry Maguire among those to go close. The bottom line is that chances weren’t taken from chances created by the Blades. They were when it was Boro’ – and Lopez completed a quite astonishing hattrick on 64 minutes. Anthony Grant launched a counter-attack and set Lopez free to drive at the goal; the Spaniard chancing his arm from distance and finding the net.
In a way, it’s almost academic that Lucas Akins also got on the scoresheet to make it four.
Stevenage 4-0 Sheffield United: What happened next?
After the game, Smith described the win as the “highlight of the season at home – a terrific result and a great performance“. It was a bit of a ‘no shit, Sherlock’ moment. But we’d been able to show that we weren’t a complete lost cause, while Dani Lopez’ stock rose massively. For anyone interested in the numbers, it moved us 13 points clear of the relegation battle – and above a Preston side who’d sacked GW one month earlier.
It wasn’t to be the silver bullet to Boro’s season, however. After such a euphoric win, surely it’d spark us into life; buying Smith some more time in charge and giving the lads a massive injection of confidence. Next up? A Tuesday trip to bottom club Bury. What could go wrong? Well, we put in a performance that instantly scrubbed memories of Saturday’s exploits. Not in a good way, you understand.
In losing 2-0 at Gigg Lane, Phil Wallace decided enough was enough. Smith hadn’t managed to put his finger on what had gone wrong since about October. As such, the axe came down. On paper, 14 defeats in 18 suggests a huge rot was setting in. Did it have anything to do with the fact that GW was now available again? Hmm – let’s not get too cynical. Our view remains, however, that Smiffy had enough credit to see the season out. But what do we know?
In conclusion….
GW came back as boss for a third stint; the hope obviously being that he could pick back up where he’d left us in January 2012. The difference is that we no longer had the momentum – or league position – for that to happen. Boro’ survived relatively comfortably come the end of the season in spite of our prolonged poor form. The following season, we were relegated. There was much to forget about watching Boro’ during that period.
But we’ll forever have memories of that 4-0 win over Sheffield United – and Lopez’ hattrick.
