dabber

Look at the numbers in here tonight @David!
Next year, get that bid in for live rights to our early rounds, and thank me from your yacht in the Med.
Or possibly the Humber.
 

Looks like our younger players are competing.

Personally, I like the little feature Sofascore has where they show the momentum of attack across the 90 minutes of the game

Looks like they really didn't want to upset the Wolves keeper by going into the area....

 
 
 
 

Wasn’t being completely serious. We need extra bodies no doubt, but not sure we need the 8 mentioned and they have to be better than what we have. 

Dove Bridge, the old road bridge between Staffordshire and Derbyshire now part of a public footpath right of way, tis a thing of beauty guiding weary travellers back home to god's own country.

Ratings Result - Middlesbrough (H)
 1   Phil Jagielka          7.95
 2  Curtis Davies        7.45
 3  Graeme Shinnie    7.43
 4  Kelle Roos             7.29
 5  Max Bird                7.02
 6  Ravel Morrison      6.86
 7  Craig Forsyth        6.60
 8  Nathan Byrne        6.46
 9  Kamil Jozwiak       6.40
10 Sam Baldock         6.19
11 Jack Stretton         6.11
12 Louie Sibley          5.95
13 Louie Watson        5.25
 
MotM Awards
Phil Jagielka          2
Craig Forsyth        1
Louie Sibley          1
 
Podium
Curtis Davies        4
Phil Jagielka         2
Craig Forsyth       1
Kelle Roos            1
Louie Sibley         1
Ravel Morrison     1
Max Bird               1
Graeme Shinnie   1
 
Top 10 Individual Ratings
 1   Phil Jagielka            8.27   vs Hull (a)
 2   Max Bird                 8.18    vs Hull (a)
 3   Phil Jagielka           7.95   vs Middlesbrough (H)
 4   Curtis Davies         7.85   vs Hull (a)
 5   Craig Forsyth         7.50   vs Huddersfield (H)
 6   Curtis Davies         7.45   vs Middlesbrough (H)
 7   Graeme Shinnie     7.43   vs Middlesbrough (H)
 8   Sam Baldock          7.35   vs Hull (a)
 9   Kamil Jozwiak        7.34   vs Hull (a)
10  Ravel Morrison       7.31   vs Hull (a)
 
Top 10 Season Average Ratings
 1    Phil Jagielka           8.14
 2   Curtis Davies          7.13
 3   Ravel Morrison       6.89
 4   Sam Baldock           6.88
 5   Lee Buchanan         6.68
 6   Max Bird                    6.61
 7   Louie Sibley             6.55
 8   Kelle Roos                6.54
 9   Graeme Shinnie     6.36
10  Kamil Jozwiak        6.35
 
 

Not so sure. We’ve looked so good this season when we play the ball short along the ground. CKR is a hero but without him we may play a better brand of football 

I'll put out a rallying call dabber. 
Was this anyone else's first game? 
I think myself and dabber could still do with sharing the burden a little further. We both already feel better knowing we are not the sole culprits.
If anyone could lighten our mental load it would be highly appreciated.
 
 

Matchday 3 – Saturday 21st August 1971 & our first away trip of the season, down the road to newly promoted upstarts Leicester City.
35,640 crammed into Filbert Street to see the mighty Rams win 2-0 with second half goals from Alan Hinton (penalty) & Kevin Hector. Couple of names of interest in the Leicester team – 22 year old Peter Shilton in net & David Nish, who joined Derby the following August for a British transfer record fee.
 

Programme of the day not really a patch on ‘The Ram’ but here you go…

And early League table after the game – Derby in second place behind surprise leaders Sheffield Utd (they finished 10th in the end)

Thanks for posting that Saul. It was my first ever game too and I glad that the subsequent 46 years of failure are not all down to me!!

What a day that was in '86, Rob Hindmarsh winner in front of 10k Derby fans in a 20k gate. Definitely in my top three away games.

I wasted that million dollars

In the long term it would make the team very old indeed!

Bird's heat map against Peterborough:

And against Hull:

Shows that he's perhaps been given a bit more license to "go where he is needed" and get on the ball in central areas now Jagielka is here.

Couple things I found interesting about the game:
As expected Baldock helps stretch the game out which has a compounding effect on the rest of team making it easier to play There was a nice balance with the attacking three midfielders today. Morrison was the only one who would drop deep (often very deep) whereas both Sibley and Jozwiak would stay high and narrow alternating between offering for the ball or looking to run beyond the backline. This had the great effect (combined with Baldock) that Sibley and Jozwiak often managed to get in a lot of space to turn and drive at the defence which I think is the major goal of what we are trying to do tactically. There was a bit of a change in how we approached build up play and I think it's the major reason why Bird could flourish. As opposed to both DMs splitting, only Shinnie would pull into the left back slot and in fact Bird would often come more central than his starting position with Morrison often dropping into either side of him. What this meant was Bird saw a hell of a lot more of the ball and could open out onto his stronger foot more readily than when cramped up on the right. It also meant that we could limit how much off the ball was going into Shinnie. I think (but I can't be sure) a lot of this is because Jagielka can be relied upon on the ball on the right so doesn't need as easy an outball to the right off him and is comfortable stepping into that space with the ball. I think to compensate slightly for this Byrne was less forwards.   

He got to the right call in the end, which is rare for refs at this level. 9 times out of 10 they seem to think they have to call it within half a second of the incident. Most refs in that situation would have just stuck with their gut instinct and played on and took the flak later. He let play continue for a few seconds while he consulted the assistant who had a different angle, and then gave it. I have to give props for that

"MAX BIRD KIDNAP SAGA FINALLY OVER" it says as a headline in the Sheeply Evening Telegraph. The culprit has finally come clean, saying that he ran around trying to look like the real Max Bird, but could never produce the football of a player of that stature.
WELCOME BACK, MAX BIRD!!!!
We had a bit of a difficult start because Hull played a tremendously high press, giving us no room or time anywhere on the pitch, and Buchanan in particular had a tough time. Their winger was pretty tricky! Davies was looking like man of the match already with some brilliant defensive play. But that is just the start.
Thankfully Hull couldn't keep that level of intensity for long, and we started to get a bit of a foothold in the match. I didn't see much of the pre-season, but the opinion was that Baldock wouldn't pull any trees up, just running around a lot, and never quite reaching through balls, and not shooting  very well, and my early observations were that yes, he does run around a lot, and isn't quite there when the ball comes through. Oh well.
Joswiak and Sibley played well - possibly their best game for the club, but faded after swopping wings for a while. Byrne and Buchannan had a tough time because Hull seemed to like getting the ball wide and getting crosses in. With Jagilka and Davies I don't mind that one bit though!
As ever we seemed very ponderous playing out from the back - it didn't seem that Shnnie played the ball forwards at any time in the 90 minutes, and we needed to get out much faster. Hull noticed, so as soon as we got the ball to Shinnie or Bird there was a swarm of Hull players in a diamond spread right in front of our player, who had nowhere to go. Good tactic, so we need to be more incisive. But how played was a decisive factor in beating that tactic, and our movement through the phases was a major factor in last night's success. The interplay was tremendous at times, with some superb touches, lay-offs and through balls. WE could have had 3 or 4 goals by half-time, but it didn't quite happen. We could have had 3 or 4 free-kicks and a penalty by half-time if we had got a ref on the pitch! Ho hum!
Ravel Morrison should have played Sibley in and we would have gone head, and probably turned Hull over big time, but he went for the lob and failed. He has great talent, but is a bit full of himself - not the arrogance of "what are you doing playing on my football pitch" attitude of Igor Stimac, but loads of confidence in his own ability. Long may it continue! 
Jagielka being hauled to the floor with a bear hug was an absolute nailed on penalty, yet Buchannan giving their man a single shoulder charge was a free-kick? Come on EFL. Sort your refs out! Same for when Stretton got booked or kicking the ball aw y late on in the game. No-one ever gets booked for that. Ever. Teams spend the entire match doing it against u, with no consequence. But this is a Derby player. And Roos - he caught a cross and was just coming back to ground, heading for the Hudd who deliberately put his shoulder into the keeper's chest, winding him. The very next moment Roos came for the cross and their CF not only made a back for him, but stepped backwards ensuring that he flipped Roos over, and there wasn't even a free-kick. This was deliberate bullying of the keeper, and Roos went apoplectic at the lino, and was booked. For protesting after being assaulted twice in two minutes. And the pull back on Baldock - did I mention his running? He caused them all sorts of trouble with it, pulling defenders away, getting in behind, and so on. The ref wasn't going to give anything. We don't do it often, but our players surrounded the ref while play was still going on, but the lino intervened, and the guy was carded. It wasn't a red, although quite close, but that the ref wasn't going to do anything yet gain was the disgrace. 
And the goal - Baldock was in the right place at the right time. Yahoooooo!!!! Did I mention his running? We now have two poachers who can score true striker's goals. We are rich beyond our wildest dreams!
At the start I thought Davies would be our man of the match by some margin, but when Roos's three harmlessly misplaced passes is about as bad as it gets, it is difficult to single one person out. So I am going to nominate a whole load of them as man of the match - the travelling supporters., who were stupendous yet again. The coverage was from Hull TV, but all we could here was our lot! Brilliant!
COME ON YOU FANS!

Should be at Los Pollos Hermanos, saying ' enjoy your meal '. 

Not sure I would agree, although I don’t want to ‘batter’ Morris just seen him gone.
The bigger picture is being lost here. Two years ago Mel Morris was very keen to get into the sale of the club in a deal being brokered by Samuelson. The programme shows Morris entering into some pretty detailed negotiations with Samuelson and a third party representative of an unknown Mr X. The programme, the way it was presented, seemed to suggest that all Morris would have known about Mr X was that he was Hong Kong Chinese (perhaps with a Cypriot passport ?) and with shed loads of money. Whether that is all that Morris knew about Mr X is pure speculation. He could have been being completely duped.
What is less speculation is that there must have been a very strong whiff about Samuelson at that time. I don’t really follow other football clubs news too much, but I do know that at the time (2019) when Morris was speaking to the representatives of Mr X there were many troubling stories circulating about the financial and shareholder troubles of both Reading and Aston Villa. Anton Zingarevich had already been bombed out of Reading leaving them in a huge mess (2014). He didn’t have any of the monies he said he had when he bought the club. Tony Xia’s ownership of Aston Villa in 2018 was regular back page news for non-payment of debts, and he was bombed out in 2019. He couldn’t get his money out of China supposedly, not that it was ever proved he had any. So the two high profile deals that Samuelson was clearly very proud of involved two individuals with a lump sum of money (somebody else’s money perhaps?) but not much behind that to support their capabilities of owning and running a football club. Now for football fans we just get the tittle tattle off the back pages, but in football circles one might imagine that a lot more about Samuelson and his dealings would have been known (particularly by the EFL). 
Morris has often been quoted as saying he wants to sell the club on to the right kind of people. I would suggest he just wants to sell and get back as much as he can. The fact that Samuelson appears to have been involved in the BZI deal as well, some 12 months later on from Mr X, and the well documented issues that were discussed on here, suggests again that the sale might have been more important than the person. I won’t bore you with my thoughts on the Erik Alonso saga. Total fantasist that bloke.
So as a long time supporter of the Rams, I think the current situation at the Club is of huge concern, and based on the programme contents, and the information that filtered out on the subsequent failed deals with BZI and Alonso, I think I have good reason to worry about who might get their hands on our great club in the months to come.

Rewatched 'Sunderland Til I Die'. 
Enjoyed it first time round but with Derby in the tail spin we are in, it was even more compelling this time. 
Gives so much insight into the way clubs operate, how players mess clubs about, how injuries and off the field incidents can dramatically alter the fortunes, how an owners attitude can filter through the club - would recommend any Derby fan to watch it and reflect. 

Finally got them by emailing the ticket office. 
I don't think she found my email funny though. 
I said it would be easier getting a Cypriot passport from Chris Samuelson. 

My first 11 with current players and everyone fit would be 

Roos.      Byrne, Stearman, Davies, Buchanon.         Bielik, Morrison, Sibley.    Lawrence, Kazim-Richards, Joswiak.

For now id have Shinnie in the holding role, with Watson & Bird coming in when we have injuries to morrison and sibley, would never play Lawrence in the middle.