Ranking the 7 best players to ever play for both Sheffield Wednesday and Sheffield United | OneFootball

We ranked the top seven best players who have spent time with both Sheffield Wednesday and Sheffield United.

With just weeks to go until the start of the new Championship season, Sheffield Wednesday and Sheffield United are two clubs who look to be heading in different directions.

Sheffield Wednesday finished 12th in the Championship last season, but they have been plunged into crisis after a nightmare summer that has seen them hit with multiple transfer embargoes and a three-window transfer ban after failing to pay the wages of players and staff on time in May and June, while the saga has also resulted in the departure of a number of key players.

Sheffield United's campaign ended in heartbreak last season as they were beaten by Sunderland in the play-off final at Wembley, but despite controversially parting company with popular manager Chris Wilder over the summer, they still look well-placed to mount another promotion challenge under new head coach Ruben Selles.

There is certainly no love lost between Wednesday and United, but a handful of players have plied their trade at both Hillsborough and Bramall Lane over the years, and defender Max Lowe became the latest to make the move across the Steel City when he joined the Owls following his release by the Blades last summer.

With that in mind, we ranked the seven best players who have spent time with both Wednesday and United.

7 Leigh Bromby

Defender Leigh Bromby came through Sheffield Wednesday's academy, and after breaking into the first team after a loan spell at Mansfield Town, he went on to score two goals in 120 senior appearances for the club.

However, after being released by the Owls in the summer of 2004, Bromby crossed the Steel City divide to join Sheffield United, and he was part of the side that won automatic promotion to the Premier League under Neil Warnock in the 2005-06 season.

Bromby made the move to Watford in January 2008 for a fee of £600,000, rising to £850,000, but after just one year at Vicarage Road, he returned to Bramall Lane on loan in January 2009 before the deal was made permanent six months later.

However, Bromby soon fell out of favour under manager Kevin Blackwell, and after scoring a combined total of seven goals and providing six assists in 139 games during his three spells at the club, he departed for Leeds United in the summer of 2009.

6 Leon Clarke

Striker Leon Clarke joined Sheffield Wednesday from Wolverhampton Wanderers in January 2007, but he scored just 18 goals in 87 games during an underwhelming three-and-a-half year spell at the club, and his time at Hillsborough ended with relegation to League One.

Clarke spent time with a host of clubs after his Owls exit, including Queens Park Rangers, Swindon Town, Charlton Athletic, Coventry City and Bury, before he made a shock return to South Yorkshire with Sheffield United in the summer of 2016.

After helping the Blades to the League One title in his first season at Bramall Lane, Clarke took his form to another level the following season in the Championship as he scored a career-best total of 19 goals in 39 games, which was more than he managed in his entire stint at Wednesday.

Unfortunately for Clarke, that would be as good as it got for him at United as his game time became increasingly limited over the next few years prior to his release in 2020, but it is fair to say he will be more fondly remembered on the red side of Sheffield.

5 Alan Quinn

After beginning his career in his native Ireland, Quinn took his first steps into English football with Sheffield Wednesday in 1997, and he scored 16 goals and provided two assists in 178 games for the club, with 20 of those appearances coming in the Premier League.

However, Quinn found himself surplus to requirements during his final years at Hillsborough, and after a loan spell at Sunderland, he joined Sheffield United on a free transfer in the summer of 2004, with his signing coincidentally being announced on the same day as Bromby as part of a quadruple swoop by Warnock.

Like Bromby, Quinn was also part of the Blades' Championship promotion-winning team in the 2005-06 season, and the 46-year-old remains the only player to have scored for both United and Wednesday in the Steel City derby.

4 Gary Madine

Striker Gary Madine arrived at Sheffield Wednesday from Carlisle United in January 2011, and he scored 28 goals and registered five assists in 113 games for the club, with 18 of those coming during the 2011-12 season as the Owls pipped their Steel City rivals to automatic promotion from League One.

Madine was a popular figure at Hillsborough, where he was given the affectionate nickname "Goal Machine", so many Wednesday supporters were understandably disappointed when he joined Sheffield United on loan from Cardiff City in January 2019.

To add insult to injury for the Owls faithful, the Blades won promotion to the Premier League during Madine's temporary spell at Bramall Lane, but the striker only scored three goals in 16 appearances, which was not enough to earn him a permanent deal.

3 Marvin Johnson

Winger Marvin Johnson spent the 2018-19 season on loan at Sheffield United from Middlesbrough as they won automatic promotion to the Premier League, but he only featured 11 times during the course of the campaign, with just four of those appearances coming from the start.

Given that Johnson had been little more than a peripheral figure at Bramall Lane, there were not too many raised eyebrows when he made the move to Sheffield Wednesday on a free transfer in August 2021 after his departure from the Riverside Stadium.

Johnson played a crucial role as the Owls won promotion from League One via the play-offs in dramatic fashion in the 2022-23 season, and he also helped them consolidate back in the Championship, scoring a total of 10 goals and providing 30 assists in 169 games for the club before being released at the end of his contract this summer.

2 Terry Curran

Winger Terry Curran joined Sheffield Wednesday from Southampton for a fee of £100,000 in March 1979, and he went on to score 39 goals in 138 appearances for the club.

Curran's best season at Hillsborough came in the 1979-80 campaign when he netted 24 times to help the Owls to promotion from Division Three, but after a breakdown in his relationship with manager Jack Charlton, he made the controversial switch to Sheffield United in the summer of 1982.

Much to the delight of Wednesday supporters, Curran's one-year spell at Bramall Lane was nowhere near as successful, and the 70-year-old recently admitted he regretted his decision to cross the Steel City divide, conceding that "it wasn’t the right thing to do".

1 David McGoldrick

Striker David McGoldrick made the move to Sheffield United from Ipswich Town on a free transfer in the summer of 2018, and after he scored 15 goals in 45 games to help the club to promotion to the Premier League in his first season at the club, he won the Player of the Year award.

While McGoldrick was unable to reach quite the same heights after that, he remained an incredibly popular figure at Bramall Lane, and he scored a total of 30 goals and registered 12 assists in 136 appearances for the Blades prior to his release in 2022.

However, while McGoldrick is perhaps best known for his time at United, he also had a brief one-month loan spell with Sheffield Wednesday back in the 2011-12 season, during which he scored one goal in four appearances.