Sheffield United 3 Scunthorpe United 0: Injuries to key men tempers leaders’ pleasure

The centre-half had to be helped from the field at the start of the second half after an accidental clash of heads and was rushed to a local hospital.

Blades boss Danny Wilson revealed the centre-half, who has helped his side go top of League One following three successive clean sheets, will now be sidelined for several weeks.

Collins’s injury, and that of striker Shaun Miller who opened the scoring but limped off with an knee injury at half-time, took the gloss off a comfortable home win which keeps United top of League One.

“With Neill, we think he has fractured his cheekbone,” said Wilson. “He is in hospital. We are not too sure of the seriousness of it yet, but it’s quite depressed so it looks like he will be out for a few weeks.

“Unfortunately this happens in football and you have to accept it, although it’s very disappointing.

“It will be at least 48 hours before Shaun can be assessed. He’s got a problem with his knee but we are unsure as to the extent of the injury.”

The Blades – unchanged from the side which beat Crawley Town away at the weekend – recalled veteran striker Richard Cresswell to the substitutes’ bench.

“We are top of the league” was the chant from the Kop as the Blades kicked off in pouring rain, but they were briefly dislodged from top spot when Brentford netted at Colchester.

But a superb individual strike from Miller in the fifth minute swiftly restored the Blades as leaders. He cut in from the right flank, had options either side in Nick Blackman or Dave Kitson, but the former Crewe striker opted to go it alone and fired low into Steve Mildenhall’s right-hand corner.

The Iron goalkeeper showed good handling to safely defuse two early Blades corners, andwhen the visitors managed to force a corner of their own, Mark Duffy’s set-piece was overhit and missed everyone in the United penalty area.

The Blades nearly made it 2-0 from Scunthorpe’s next corner. The ball broke to Miller who drew Iron’s two defenders to him before feeding Blackman.

Unfortunately the pass was just behind the former Blackburn Rovers striker, United’s top scorer this campaign, and the visitors were able to recover, forcing Blackman to shoot from distance.

The Blades were putting together some impressive attacking phases, and came close to a superb goal midway through the first half. Incisive passing around Scunthorpe’s back four culminated in Miller just failing to pick out Kitson to cap off what would have been a contender for goal of the season.

And Miller himself was just inches away from giving United a second goal moments later. Again his movement found space, before the ball broke fortuitously to the overlapping Ryan Flynn.

But his cross just evaded the onrushing Miller as the Blades continued to search for a second goal before half-time.

Yet Scunthorpe should have been level in the 37th minute. Damien Mozika was giftwrapped a goal from eight yards but he headed the ball into the ground with goalkeeper George Long looking beaten, only for the bounce to see the ball fly up against the crossbar. From the rebound, Andy Barcham’s follow-up was pawed away by Long.

Flynn had a hopeful penalty appeal turned down by referee Gary Sutton before Miller saw his deflected shot wrongfoot Mildenhall, only to see it trickle wide of the target.

Long was equal to Tom Newey’s 20-yard free kick, while a surging run down the right from Duffy ended with three Iron team-mates failing to convert his inviting low cross.

The Blades doubled their advantage on 56 minutes, Kitson was felled by Niall Canavan and United supporters in the 21,819 crowd were unhappy the foul failed to produce a yellow card for the Iron player.

But their jeers turned to cheers within seconds, as Tony McMahon – who netted twice from free-kicks against Crawley – this time turned provider, his cross picking out Kitson who powered his header beyond Mildenhall.

The Blades wrapped up victory when two audacious back-heels saw the ball find its way through to Flynn, who was barged over by Newey, and Blackman rolled in the resulting penalty

Sheffield United: Long, McMahon, Maguire, Collins (Williams 50), Hill, Blackman, McDonald, Doyle, Flynn, Miller (Cofie 46), Kitson (Cresswell 85). Unused substitutes: Coyne, Westlake, McAllister, Ironside.

Scunthorpe: Mildenhall, Ribeiro, Reid, Canavan, Newey, Duffy (Kennedy 90), Collins, Mozika, Ryan (Ellington 63), Barcham, Hawley (Djeziri 78). Unused substitutes: Slocombe, Grella, Gibbons, Godden.

Referee: G Sutton (Lincolnshire).