Sheffield United: Legal challenge was launched to try and delay Anel Ahmedhodzic's suspension at Watford
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The Bosnia and Herzegovina international had been pencilled in to start the fixture, which was settled by Joao Pedro’s finish soon after the interval.
But United discovered on Thursday that Ahmedhodzic, a £3m purchase from Malmo, was set to serve a one match suspension after being booked towards the end of his loan spell with Bordeaux.
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“Legally, it should have been declared during the transfer,” Heckingbottom told The Star. “We were going down the route of us not receiving all of the information, and that it was unfair.”
“Malmo should really declare it,” Heckingbottom added. “We want he player, so what can we do? We aren’t going to pull out of the transfer, are we.
“We wanted Anel and we asked the FA if it could be pushed back. They wouldn’t do it. We thought we had a case. We got the lawyers involved but, unfortunately, it didn’t work.”
Pedro’s strike, early in the second-half, proved enough to settle an encounter which exposed both United’s strengths and weaknesses. As you would expect of a team which conceded only 17 times after Christmas last term, they were resilient - successfully negotiating their way through a torrid opening period which saw Emmanual Dennis and Ismaila Sarr cause all manner of problems. Indeed, despite Watford’s dominance during the opening exchanges, it was the visitors who created the better chances with Iliman Ndiaye, Sander Berge and Daniel Jebbison all forcing Daniel Bachmann to make saves.
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But United, who must hope new signing Reda Khadra and Ndiaye can fill the void created by Morgan Gibbs-White’s departure, should have prevented Watford from darting upfield after the referee had appeared to impede John Fleck at a corner. Both the Scot and Rhys Norrington Davies had opportunities to stop the ball from making its way out to Sarr, who provided the assist for Pedro to score.
Heckingbottom was furious with the match officials on the touchline, being cautioned by Josh Smith after taking his protests too far. Although the 44-year-old’s displeasure was understandable, the footage of two United players failing to intercept possession during the build-up to the Brazilian’s effort will make for disappointing viewing.
“You want to get me into trouble,” said Heckingbottom, who was forced to deploy debutant Ciaran Clark in an unfamiliar role in the right hand side of defence in Ahmedhodzic’s absence. “The goal doesn’t happen without his (the referee’s) involvement but we could still have stopped it.”
“Ciaran was playing out of position and missed the first few weeks of pre-season,” he added. “We also lost Jack Robinson to an injury during training late on, which caused us an issue.
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Hide Ad“And with Anel having that booking from his time with Bordeaux, which wasn’t processed, we had to make changes. We found out on Thursday. It only came through when we got the clearance.”