Chris Wilder

The Sheffield United boss feels people have been too quick to target players, with widespread calls for them to take a pay cut.

On Friday the Premier League proposed a 30 per cent wage reduction to its member clubs and Wilder backed players across all levels of the sport to "do the right thing".

"They're conscious people. These boys are from working-class cities, very few of our players are privately educated," he told talkSPORT.

"They've got brothers, sisters, uncles, aunties, mums and dads working at the NHS and not getting paid.

"They'll do the right thing through the PFA [Professional Footballers' Association]. Straight away everyone was onto footballers, pointing the finger, and I thought it was very poor and distasteful.

"There is a lot of money floating about, especially at the top, but this football country is not all about the Premier League, it goes right down to the National League and even below.

"Proper football people do the right thing."

Wilder will be the Hornets' third permanent boss of the season after Rob Edwards was relieved of his duties in September having overseen just 10 league games, with Bilic named his replacement.

But after a 0-0 home draw with Preston North End at the weekend, Bilic now leaves Vicarage Road after a run of just one victory in his last eight Championship fixtures and with the club four points off the play-off spots.

Ben Manga, Watford's technical director, said a change of coach was "the only option available to re-energise for the final games ahead".

Wilder, who led Sheffield United from League One to the Premier League during a hugely successful spell between 2016 and 2021, was sacked earlier this season by Watford's fellow Championship side Middlesbrough, who were in the bottom three when he was sacked in October.

He becomes the 17th permanent boss at Vicarage Road since the Pozzo family acquired the club in June 2012.

Wilder's first game in charge will come away at Queens Park Rangers on Saturday.