If one of Leeds United’s title rivals could turn back the clock, you would imagine they would have thought better of selling one of their key players to the team at the top of the table.
Yet, that obvious ability did not prevent Wilder’s Sheffield United bosses from accepting a £5 million bid from Leeds U I’mnited during the summer of 2024.
The Blades’ loss has most certainly been The Whites’ gain too.
Daniel Farke felt Bogle had been Leeds’ standout performer towards the end of last year and the first few weeks of this one.
When finishing off a fabulous solo run in a 2-0 win at Coventry City a few weeks after that, Bogle took his tally to four for the Championship season.
In a Leeds United side comfortably the most prolific in the division, Jayden Bogle has emerged as a reliable source of creativity.
And former England international Lee Hendrie, who spent two years at Bramall Lane between 2007 and 2009, agrees with Wilder when assessing the increasingly bizarre decision to let Bogle swap one title chaser for another.
In addition to his excellent attacking output, meanwhile, Hendrie has been taken aback somewhat by the quality of Bogle’s defending this season too.
Farke has given Bogle and the suddenly free-scoring Junior Firpo such freedom to join the attacks. Firpo scored the equaliser as Leeds came from behind to beat Sheffield United in a crucial top of the table clash before netting against in last week’s 1-1 draw with West Brom.
“Sometimes, it doesn’t have the fit, you want to get away and change,” Hendrie adds. “I think he suits the way that Leeds play because the full-backs get high up the pitch. He can go and get involved.
“I’ve always thought that he’s an attacking-minded full-back but, defensively, he has them good attributes.
“But yes, I think [the answer] to the question is that they will regret that they’ve let him slip between their fingers and head to Leeds because it looks like he could be playing in the Premier League, maybe against them as well. That’ll be one that they’ll look at and think ‘I wish we’d kept hold of him’.
To think, there were a lot of Leeds fans not exactly pleased with last summer’s transfer business. After losing Archie Gray, Georginio Rutter and Crysensio Summerville, the likes of Ao Tanaka, Joe Rothwell and Bogle did not exactly get the hair standing up on end.
In hindsight, it is a window that has aged far better than even the more optimistic supporters might have anticipated.
“I thought it was one of the best bits of business we ever did at Sheffield United, bringing him in,” Wilder said before that February meeting in the Steel City.
“He was outstanding, and he’s a great kid. He had an opportunity to go to a top club. I don’t think we should have sold him, if I’m being perfectly honest. But that decision was not my decision.
I want to build and keep our best players and build around them.
“Jayden was one of our best players last season, without a doubt.
And I’d have liked to have built around him. But it didn’t happen, for one reason or the other, and he’s gone on and moved on and had an outstanding season.”
