One of the fiercest derbies in English football is not Liverpool against Manchester United or the North London derby. Instead it’s in the Steel City where Sheffield Wednesday and Sheffield United clash against each other. And the first time these two clubs will meet this season happens this Sunday at Bramall Lane.

This season it’ll be quite different as both Sheffield clubs are seeking promotion from League One back into the Championship. Despite being a league lower than where you’d expect each club (at least, historically), this should be an exciting match. It’s the first time the two clubs have faced each other in the third tier of English football since 1980. Both clubs will be hopeful to pick up vital points to mount a serious promotion challenge.

“We’re excited about it, it’s a massive game and the city is buzzing – it can’t come round quick enough,” says United’s former Wednesday forward Richard Cresswell. “Both teams are looking for one thing and that’s promotion. It’s a Steel City derby but the main thing is to get out of League One. Both clubs really should be at a higher level. That’s the ultimate aim.”

For those of you who want to walk down memory lane, here are a couple of golden-oldie videos:

First, the 2003 win by United:

And here’s a 1994 victory by Wednesday over United:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzPVJKLm2nU

Things could have been so different for Sheffield Wednesday. The Yorkshire club, currently in League One, were the first English club to give a trial to French legend Eric Cantona in 1992. As you’ll see from the video accompanying this article, Cantona even played one game for Wednesday, albeit an indoor game, but still, it’s quite an interesting chapter in the history of the temperamental Frenchman nicknamed King Eric.

After playing in the indoor game, Sheffield Wednesday manager Trevor Francis insisted that Cantona extend his trial by one week so he could see how Cantona played on grass. In hindsight, it was a ridiculous request by Francis when you consider that Cantona had already played almost 200 league games in France by that point. So, not surprisingly, Cantona refused to extend his trial and joined Yorkshire neighbors Leeds United instead.

The rest, as they say, is history. Under Cantona, Leeds United went on to win the league title and Charity Shield in 1992. Cantona was then sold later that year to Manchester United for £1.2 million. At Manchester United, Cantona won the player of the year award, four Premier League titles, two FA Cups and three Charity Shields.

Was this a massive mistake by Trevor Francis? Watch the video and you decide!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMcAtWOqnRY

The thrid round of the FA Cup draw is out and here is who the teams of the CCC will face. The ties will be played the weekend of January 3, 2009. If the tie is tied then a replay will be played.

Portsmouth v Bristol City – Ashton Gate

Sheffield Wednesday v Fulham – Hillbrough

Preston NE v Liverpool – Deepdale

Birmingham City v Wolves – St. Andrew’s Stadium

West Ham United v Barnsley – Upton Park

Manchester City v Nottingham Forest – Eastlands

Cardiff City v Reading – Ninan Park

Ipswich Town v Chesterfield/Droylesden – Portman Road

Charlton v Norwich – The Valley

Torquay v Blackpool – Plainmoor

Leyton Orient v Sheffield United – Brisbane Road

Southampton v Manchester United – St. Mary’s Stadium

Histon v Swansea City – Bridge Road

Forest Green Rovers v Derby County – The New Lawn

QPR v Burnley – Turf Moor

Leicester City v Crystal Palace – Walkers Stadium

Morcambe/Cheltenham v Doncaster

Arsenal v Plymouth – Emirates Stadium

Watford v Scunthorpe – Vicarage Road

Coventry City v Kidderminster – Richo Arena

The transfer window may be closed but Championship Teams are still active in the loan market. Deals that are struck between clubs about transfers won’t go through until Janruary 1st, 2009. Here is the latest activity in the loan market:

Andy Todd: From Derby County to Northampton Town

Keith Gillespie: From Sheffield United to Charlton Athletic

Chris Weale: From Bristol City to Hereford United

Luke Varney: From Charlton to Derby County (will be made permanate in Jan for 1M)

Graham Stack: From Plymouth to Blackpool

Bartosz Slusarski: From West Brom to Sheffield Wed

Kurt Robinson: From Ipswich Town to Northampton Town

Kyel Reid: From West Ham to Blackpool

Steve Jones: From Burnley to Bradford City

Shane Higgs: From Cheltenham Town to Wolves

Joshua Gowing: From Bristol City to Hereford United

Mitchell Hanson: From Derby County to Notts County

Liam Dickenson: From Derby County to Blackpool

Mark Davies: From Wolves to Leicester

Jamie Cureton: From Norwich to Barnsley

Deon Burton: From Sheffield Wed to Charlton

Steve Brooker: From Bristol City to Doncaster

Liam Bridcutt: From Chelsea to Watford

Chris Birchall: From Coventry City to Carlisle United

Ashely Barnes: From Plymouth to Gainsbrough Trinity

On Saturday the CCC season officially started as 24 teams battle to win promotion to the English Premier League and the riches that would come with that promotion. For the three promoted teams, Swansea City, Nottingham Forest and Doncaster, they are looking to establish themselves and avoid an immediate return to League One while Reading, Birmingham and Derby County look to bounce straight back to the EPL. One thing that is known about the CCC, there is no sure thing in this division and anything can happen. Here the results from the first weekend of action.

Birmingham City 1 (Kevin Phillips 90′) Sheffield United 0

Blackpool 0 Bristol City 1(Steve Brooker 90′)

Cardiff City 2(Steven Thompson 41,Roger Johnson 90′) Southampton 1 (David McGoldrick 45′)

Charlton 2 (Mark Hudson 3′, Andy Gray 85′) Swansea City 0

Coventry City 2 (Elliot Ward,pen 48′, Leon McKenzie 86′) Norwich City 0

Crystal Palace 0 Watford 0

Derby County 0 Doncaster 1 (Lewis Guy 59′)

Ipswich 1 (Kevin Lisbie 2′) Preston NE 2(Paul McKenna 21, Simon Whaley 34)

Plymouth 2 (Rory Fallon 7′, Marcel Siep 55′) Wolves 2 (Michael Knightly 19′, Sam Vokes 78′)

QPR 2(Fritz Hall 29,31′) Barnsley 1 (Iain Hume 5′)

Sheffield Wednesday 4(Marcus Tudgay 1′,65′, Apko Sodje 4’17′) Burnely 1 (Martin Paterson 6′)

Nottingham Forest 0 Reading 0

The Carling Cup is next up for the CCC teams on Tuesday and Wednesday then back to CCC action on Saturday.

Sheffield Wednesday

Founded: 1867

Nickname: Owls, Wednesday

Ground: Hillsborough (39,814)

Last Season: 16th in the CCC 55 points

FA Cup Winners: 1896, 1907, 1935

League Cup Winners: 1991

Community Shield Winners: 1935

First Division Winners: 1903, 1904, 1929, 1930

Second Divsion/CCC Winners: 1900, 1926, 1952, 1956, 1959

Norwich City

In: Sammy Clingan (Nottingham Forest, free), Wes Hoolahan (Blackpool, undisclosed), Ryan Bertrand (Chelsea, loan)

Out: Mark Gilks (Blackpool, undisclosed), Andrew Cave-Brown (Leyton Orient, free) Darren Huckerby (San Jose Earthquakes)

Released: Juan Velasco,Matthew Halliday, Rossi Jarvis, Steven Arnold, Ryan Jarvis, Patrick Bexfield, Bally Smart

Nottingham Forest

In: Robert Earnshaw (Derby County, 2.65M), Andrew Cole (Sunderland, undisclosed), Guy Moussi (Angers, undisclosed)

Out: Kris Commons (Derby County, Free), Alan Pwer (Hartlepool United, free), Junior Agogo (Zamaleck Sporting Club, undisclosed), Grant Holt (Shrewbury Town, 170K), Sammy Clingan (Norwich City, free), Matt Lockwood (Colchester United, free), Felix Bastians (released)

Plymouth

In: Jason Puncheon (Barnet, 250K), Karl Duguid (Colchester United, undisclosed)

Out: Paul Connolly (Derby County, free), Paul Wotton (Southampton, free), Nadjim Abdou (Millwall, free)

Preston NE

In: None

Out: None

Queens Park Rangers

In: Peter Ramage (Newcastle United, free) Samuel Di Carmine (Fiorentina, loan), Radek Cerny (Slavia Prauge, free), Jorge Ledesema ( Genoa, loan)

Out: Stefan Bailey (Grays Athletic, free), Daniel Nardiello (Barnsley, end of loan)

Released: Istvan Ferenczi, Sam Togwell, Paul Reid, Andy Johnson, Kim Christensen

Reading

In: None

Out: Adam Bygrave (Weymouth, free), Joshua Webb (Weymouth, undisclosed), Ben Hamer (Brentford, loan), Glen Little (Portsmouth, undislcosed)

Released: John Oster, Aaron Brown, Ulises De La Cruz, Graham Stack, John Halls

Sheffield United

In: Greg Halford (Sunderland, loan), Sun Jihai (Manchester City, free)

Out: Lloyd Kerry (Chesterfield, free), Chris Lucketti (Huddersfield Town, free)

Released: Paul Gerrard, Dean Oliver, Geoff Horsfield, Stephen Hernandez, James Ashmore, Martin Donnelly

Sheffield Wednesday

In: James O’Connor (Burnely, free)

Out: None

Released: Ronnie Walworkd, Jason Bradley, Burton O’Briend, Rob Burch, Dave McClemments, James Kay

Southampton

In: Lee Holmes (Derby County, free), Chris Perry, Luton Town, free) Paul Wotton (Plymouth, free), Morgan Schneiderlin (Strasbourg, 1.2M), Tommy Forecast (Tottenham, undisclosed)

Out: Cedric Baseya (Lille, free)

Swansea City

In: Ashley Williams (Stockport County, 400K), Albert Serran (Espanyol, 80K), Gorka Pintado (Granada, undisclosed), Federico Bessone (Espanyol, free), Jordi Gomez (Espanyol, loan) Mark Gower (Southend United, free)

Out: Andy Robinson (Leeds United, free) Daryryl Duffy (Bristol Rovers, free), Kevin Austin (Chesterfield, free), Kevin Amankwaah (Swindon Town, free)

Watford

In: None

Out: Nathan Ellington (Derby County, free), Jordan Stewart (Derby County, free) Toumani Diagouraga (Stockport, free) Santiago Aloi (River Plate, end of loan)

Wolves

In: David Jones (Derby County, undisclosed), Sam Vokes (AFC Bournemouth, undisclosed), Richard Sterman (Leicester City, undisclosed)

Out: None

Released: Gary Breen, Keith Lowe Kevin O’Connor

Here are the final fixtures for the teams in the CCC for the pre-season.

Sheffield United

14 July Ferecvaros (A, Hungary)

16 July KRC Genk (A, Belgium)

19 July Helmond Sport (A, Holland)

26 July Scunthorpe United (A)

29 July Bury (A)

2 August Huddersfield Town (A)

Sheffield Wednesday

15 July HFC Harrlem (A)

17 July Stormbogel Telstar (A)

22 July MK Dons (A0

26 July Bury (A)

29 July Chesterfield (A)

2 August Wigan (H)

Southampton

18 July Celtic (H)

26 July Exeter (A)

29 July Hereford (A)

1 August West Ham (H)

5 August Stoke (H)

Swansea City

The Swans will be on a tour of Spain from 23-29 July.

17 July Port Talbot (A)

25 July Espanyol

26 July Girona

27 July Palamos

28 July Barcelona “B”

31 July Chester City (A)

5 August ADO Den Haag (H)

Watford

22 July Borehamwood (A)

26 July Brentford (A)

30 July MK Dons (A)

2 August Barnet (A)

Wolves

16 July Hereford (A)

Sheffield Wednesday’s academy has formed a partnership with the Kalamazoo Outrage to create new opportunities for young players at both clubs. The Kalamazoo Outrage is a new club founded in 2007 and will compete in the Premier Development League (the fourth tier of men’s soccer in the US). The Wednesday academy is also pursuing possible tie-ups with a club in Vancouver, Canada while former Owl Juan Cobain is looking at a similar set up with a club in Argentina.

This sort of partnership will only help North American soccer move forward and I hope there are more of these setups put in place in the near future.

There were buckets of goals in the Championship this past weekend. Three matches had 3-0 scorelines (Plymouth beat Norwich, Charlton beat Cardiff, Hull beat Preston), West Brom thumped 10-man Coventry 4-0, Sheffield Wednesday lit up Southampton for five goals and Ipswich embarrassed Bristol City by a 6-0 scoreline.

For Coventry, striker Michael Mifsud was sent off after only 10 minutes for a nasty and flagrant elbow on defender Carl Hoefkens, but it took the Baggies until the 56th minute to capitalize on their advantage. Filipe Teixeira ran riot for West Brom with two goals and set up another.

As Brian mentioned on the most recent episode of the Championship Talk podcast, Southampton’s defence was shambolic against Sheffield Wednesday. The prime example for me was early into the secound half on Akpo Sodje’s first goal when four Southampton defenders could not contain two Wednesday forwards. They all appeared confused and simply stood off Sodje as he fired the ball past Kelvin Davis. That seemed to open the floodgates and Wednesday had the run of the match the rest of the way. Manager George Burley said “To concede in the manner we did was ridiculous. You can’t defend like that.” The Owls are now unbeaten in four matches and look to be turning their season around.

Promotion favourites, Charlton, sit in third place just two points back of West Brom. Chris Iwelumo was on target again for Charlton and now has 7 goals in 16 appearances this season and has been a very solid signing. The loss for Cardiff pushed them to the edge of the relegation zone. They remain above the drop solely on goal difference and the heat will be turned up on manager Dave Jones. Jones has already been under fire for the team’s poor start, been taken to task for missing a reserve game to attend the launch of chairman Peter Ridsdale’s book and has been put up “for sale” on eBay, by a disgruntled fan who hoped the club would take the hint and sack Jones.

In a battle of struggling sides, Norwich’s extended their run without a victory to 12 matches while Plymouth grabbed their first victory in four attempts.

Ipswich were powered by a Jonathan Walters hat trick as they cruised past Bristol City. They continued their 100 per cent record at Portman Road in the league this season and tore apart an opposition side that many expected to present them with a tough match. Ipswich looked a class apart at times and David Wright’s header for the second goal was a thing of beauty.

Here’s hoping the goals keep flowing in the next round of matches!