Sheffield United club captain John Egan is taking a relaxed view on his future as he comes towards the end of his current contract.

The central defender has been a hugely important figure at the Blades during two promotion successes under Chris Wilder and Paul Heckingbottom – a key cog in the overloading backline that rocked the Premier League under Wilder in 2019/20 and led to a ninth-placed finish that arguably could have been even higher but for the Covid-19 pandemic.

This campaign, however, has been one to forget for the Republic of Ireland international who, having picked up an achilles injury against West Ham at the end of September has been missing ever since.

That has led to questions over whether United fans will ever see Egan in a United shirt again, with the 31-year-old among a huge number of players whose contracts run out at the end of this season.

Egan has acknowledged that his next deal may be signed elsewhere;

“It’s part of the game,” he told the Independent. “You could be somewhere for six months, you could be somewhere for six years. You just never know.”

If it is the case that Egan does move on, he will leave with a barrow-load of memories having played such a huge role in what has overall been an incredibly successful period for United.

“It’s the longest I’ve spent at a club in England and we’ve had a lot of success,” he added. “When I look back on my career so far, all my best moments were with United. We got promoted twice to the Premier League, had a great year the first year, I broke into the Ireland team while I was at United. I’ve loved every minute of it. It’s a fantastic club. The Premier League is where the club deserve to be.”