How Sheffield United should handle the big Iliman Ndiaye gamble amid promotion bid - Alan Biggs at Large

Somehow avoiding that particular “transfer” is the biggest business of Heckingbottom’s January transfer window and he will be acutely aware of the background.

And while new owners, amid fresh takeover intrigue, might head off the threat, there are no certainties and an often protracted timescale where buy-outs are concerned.

For all the irresistible logic of keeping Premier League return ambitions intact, there are two certainties the Blades boss is helpless to change.

One is that his most coveted and arguably most influential player is certain to attract major interest.

The other is that the club is continuing to run on a big shortfall, having not made a single major sale, Aaron Ramsdale apart, since being relegated from the top flight two seasons ago.

That is highly unusual. It also reflects credit on the club’s hierarchy for holding firm, albeit that bids for the honey-pot player of the last window, Sander Berge, did not come close to their valuation.

This time Berge, on his way back from another injury, will not be the top draw. But United will never have a more stick-or-twist month - with Anel Ahmedhodzic a bigger eye-catcher.

That said, it is not entirely in the board’s hands and certainly not Heckingbottom’s.

There will be a figure on Ndiaye that is impossible to ignore. Beyond that, too, a move that the lad himself would find too tempting - and players’ wishes, in these circumstances, tend to hold sway.

Not sure how you gauge valuations in today’s market, by the way. I’m thinking that in the case of a gifted Senegal international who has just played in the World Cup, £30m-£40m would only be a starter for ten.

Yet it’s good that, like Berge, Ndiaye is hardly busting a gut to leave.

He knows, as does Heckingbottom, that he has a great chance of reaching the Premier League right where he is - and a better chance of appearing regularly too, rather than being swallowed into the squad of a bigger outfit.

Prince Abdullah also knows that. I doubt there will be the same encouragement of bids that there appeared to be for Berge who I would rate as far more expendable, without detracting from his obvious calibre.

The bottom line is that if United fall short of their goal there will have to be a balancing of their books next summer that could see the break up of one of the club’s most successful teams.

Cashing in on Ndiaye might go some way to preventing that future scenario, but would it also kill off the present?

Leave it to next summer and let the promotion bid decide. Another gamble then, balancing what’s to gain with what’s to lose.

I think United, so healthy and well-placed, have the biggest amount to lose.