Liam Manning will surely be livid at EFL announcement for Bristol City clash vs Sheffield United

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Bristol City play host to Sheffield United in the first leg of their Championship play-off clash on Thursday, and the EFL have announced something controversial.

The Championship play-offs are the most wonderful time of the year for most EFL supporters, and it’s Bristol City’s first time involved since 2008.

On that occasion, a Dean Windass wonder volley broke their hearts in the final at Wembley, with Liam Manning now looking to rewrite history.

Leicester City-linked Manning has done a tremendous job to guide the Robins into the top six, but the real challenge ahead of them is beating Sheffield United over two legs.

The Blades were in hot pursuit of automatic promotion for most of the campaign and ended up 22 points above Bristol City in the table.

• READ MORE: Liam Manning reveals what Nigel Pearson left at Bristol City that inspired Championship play-off place

Oliver Langford will referee Bristol City vs Sheffield United

Bristol City will need everything to go their way to progress past Chris Wilder’s men, including the refereeing decisions.

Oliver Langford will take charge of the contest at Ashton Gate, with Stephen Martin as his fourth official.

Langford has officiated 29 Bristol City matches, his joint-most with Queens Park Rangers, and the Reds have secured 11 wins, nine draws and nine defeats.

The Englishman has also dished out 46 yellow cards in their fixtures and three reds. Controversially, two of those dismissals came in their match against Oxford United in February, with supporters perhaps remembering how poor his performance was.

Liam Manning slammed Langford for his performance in Oxford United contest

In February, Bristol City travelled to relegation-threatened Oxford in search of an important three points in the Championship.

• READ MORE: EFL pundit reveals major Bristol City concern ahead of Sheffield United clash, it’s actually ‘sad’

However, the Robins were given a mountain to climb when Joe Williams was shown a straight red card for a foul on Will Vaulks before losing defender Ross McCrorie to his second booking late in the game.

Remarkably, the visitors held onto a point through Mark Sykes’ goal, but Manning wasn’t happy with Langford’s refereeing display, slamming him for his inconsistent decisions.

“I think the referee had an extremely poor performance,” Robins boss Manning said via BBC Sport. “It probably created a lot of frustration for our fans, staff and players purely from the inconsistency when you look at some of the decisions.

“Emotions get increased because you don’t know what is a foul, what is a yellow card and so on. There were many the other way as well, so I’m not saying we were hard done by.

“I think he was just inconsistent for both sides, which creates the frustration and rather than being about the players playing the game, it becomes how he manages it and the decisions he makes.

With Manning left annoyed by his subpar performance, some will question how he’s now officiating such a high-profile game but he’ll just hope it isn’t riddled with mistakes once more.