There will be a club from Yorkshire in the Premier League next season.
Hull City and Sheffield Wednesday will contest the Championship Playoff final on May 28, as the winner will join Burnley and Middlesbrough in gaining promotion to the Premier League for the 2016-17 season.
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With the new TV deal kicking in from next season, this match has once again been dubbed “the richest game in world soccer” as the winner will gain approximately $180 million for being part of the PL next season.
Due to that fact there is a lot of pressure on the line in the one-off, winner takes all encounter. Are there bigger stakes, financially, in any other single sporting game worldwide?
Hull sealed their place in the final with a nervy 2-0 home defeat against Derby County on Tuesday, with Steve Bruce’s side hanging on and advancing to the Wembley showpiece thanks to their 3-0 away win in the first leg of the playoff semifinal.
Sheffield Wednesday, who were the final team to make the playoffs after finishing in sixth place this season, beat third-placed Brighton 3-1 on aggregate over the two legs and although they lingered in and around sixth place for most of this season they have momentum and could be deemed as the favorites to seal promotion.
Wednesday were last in the top-flight in 2000 but haven’t been back since, even suffering relegation to the third-tier. However, with billionaire owners from Thailand and a huge fanbase in the Steel City, they have the resources to stay up and establish themselves if they gain promotion.
For Hull, they were relegated from the PL last season and Bruce has kept the majority of his squad together who have bags of PL experience to handle occasions like this.
One thing we know about playoff finals in the past is that everything else goes out the window. It is a one-off game to get to the promised land and you can expect a nervous 90 minutes, or even extra time and a penalty shootout should it come to that.
The only think we do know is that Yorkshire will have a team in the PL next season.