Fla Ram

He was great tonight. That's why we need to persevere with him. He's hugely talented and capable of troubling most defenses in this league. 

What a performance.
Didn't put a foot wrong all game. Calm on the ball, great positioning, great leadership, won every tackle, won every header, even when they outpaced him he just put his body in the way?.  Age is just a number!

Roos commanded his box tonight. Back 4 immense, Bird and Shinnie superb. Jos showed he cared, Morrison class, Sibley great and Baldock class finish. Well done all and well done Wayne. Your boys did you proud.

Brilliant away performance, limited them to very little.
Jagielka & Davies 2 Rolls Royces at the back. Best game from Bird & Jozwiak in a long time.
I am a big CKR fan but tonight has shown a more mobile front man means the whole front 4 have space.

Cocu got a pretty average Derby team to tenth during his first season in charge despite everything that went against him. Sibley, Bird and Knight all performed far better under him.
His transfer targets such as Dursun, Panzo and Moore had brilliant seasons last year.
Cocu was a slow burner. But he improved players and could spot potential transfer targets to move us forward. His time at PSV proved with the right pieces in place, he could succeed.
But he was undermined by Wayne Rooney's arrival while restricted from making any signings due to the circumstances caused by Mel Morris. Bizarre you would give up on him after the Charlton away game, which was about 10 game into his first season, working with an average squad. What were you expecting? Bielsa-ball?
There were signs after that we were on the right track. Like the back-to-back wins over Sheffield Wednesday and Blackburn, the latter a crushing 3-0 win where Wayne Rooney didn't even play.
Post lockdown, we still had momentum and Louie Sibley was being talked about as a potential superstar. But by that point, Rooney's fitness was so dire we were starting games with ten players.
Cocu's job come the second season was impossible. We were obliged to play Rooney who was awful, while we started the season without a recognised striker due to an embargo and the Martin fiasco.
The subsequent improvement in form after Cocu's exit was down to Rooney retiring and Krystian Bielik coming back. Not only were we playing with 11 men again, but we had arguably the best midfielder in the league absolutely running it for us. 

How long since a league win ? what style are we trying to play ? It’s a shambles on the field with a decent starting 11 , we are open as hell down our right , disjointed going forward and disorganised in defence ,, it’s a joke , ex player with zero management skills and ex pundit with no skill either ,, please god give it to wassell over these clowns 

One has to ask why Mel bought the club 6 years ago in the first place. 
I’m absolutely amazed that a so called “business man” couldn’t see that if the gamble to get promotion failed, then he’d lose money. 
He can’t be surprised by it. 
It needed to be a long term project; it wasn’t and he is bearing the consequences. 

If we haven’t breached (which would be a great outcome for us) it will mean we’ve had to endure 2 years of absolute dross for nothing. The club has been pushed to the brink of oblivion because of an accountancy method. I’ve never been more disinterested with football than I am now, some clubs signing players for £100m+, players earning £50m a year yet all we want is a couple more frees to bolster our threadbare squad, football is dead.

He'll be fine if we play Sibley and Watson with him because they know how to thread the ball through to him.

Reminds me of Adam Armstrong.
We just need some creative players behind him to feed passes beyond the oppostion defence. Louie Watson played some excellent passes against Salford. Need more of the same!

Rooney and the split midfielders tactic in real time

Can someone explain to me the rationale behind the split midfielder tactic? I’ve never seen anything so ridiculous. We push both full backs high, and replace the full backs with our central midfielders Meaning our attackers drop deep into midfield to receive the ball, leaving the centre of the pitch exposed. Very bizarre. 
Early days, but so far I see very little benefit. The midfielders are 60 yards apart. We can’t build up play, can’t create angles and everyone, bar the full backs, drops deeper. I’m guessing the idea is to create overloads on either side, but we barely get the ball higher up the pitch to make this effective. Weird tactic. 

Wayne Rooney has still yet to win a league game as Derby County manager without Krystian Bielik or Lee Gregory (who is no longer here) starting the match.
Since November last year.
The current record without those two players is P12 W0 D2 L10

Lee Bowyer has proven what’s possible with a clued up and organised manager taking over a struggling team. 

Or we could just file our accounts ffs 

No,they all deserve it i.m.o.
Rooney had been let down by his bosses but he took on a job he isn't qualified or suited to at this stage of his career and he seems unable to learn from his mistakes whilst managing and coaching which is even more to our detriment.
His worst aspect however is his misguided self belief and he won't admit it's too big a job for him and walk away.

Now is time for Mel Morris to face the music and admit defeat to the EFL.
We CANNOT end the window with this squad of players. Threadbare, inexperienced and totally out of its depth. Additions are desperately needed.
Peterborough would’ve been picked off 2 or 3-0 by any other competent Championship side after they had conceded the 1st. Unforgivable. 
Take the points deduction and deal with it head on. This constant limbo is crippling.
We’re good as down if nothing changes between now and September 1st.

A very special piece of DCFC history from our most successful period, from the greatest management partnership in football ever, the man who spotted the players to make our team ! Peter Taylors club blazer & Tie from 1972/74 up to when he resigned, entrusted to us at the Rams Heritage Trust by his daughter @WendyDickinson5, 

It is mate. 
I get that we are customers. But I hate the term. We're supporters. We'll always be here.
This is what football has become though. We are just seen as customers now.
The club doesn't care. The way they have treated the fans recently is nothing short of disgusting.
Mel Morris is constantly in the news, doing interviews when things are going well.
The second it all goes wrong, the second the supporters want answers they deserve, he's gone.
The fans deserve more and they deserve to be treated better.

I’m sorry to hear that B4. I know how important they are to a lot of people, this along with the season tickets, just shows another side of Mel that I really wish I hadn’t. It’s like his actively trying to disengage fans, for whatever reason. I’ll just be happy when he’s gone now. 6 months ago I’d have loved nothing more than him to try and make a success of it here, now I just want this bleak period of Derby County to be done. He’s definitely established himself alongside the Maxwells and Amigos of this club’s history. 

Snappy passes all night, the one to Stretton was George Thorne quality.
Quick tempo, this is what we want, and to top it off he scored the winning peno.
Well done Louis!

I’m so unbelievably proud of our lads tonight. Rooney was spot on in saying they grew from boys into men during the 90 minutes. So many positives, we not only have extremely talented youngsters, they also have real bravery and character.
Take the first 20 mins out of it when nerves got the better of them, from that point they were outstanding. Festy is frightening!! Must be quickest player in the championship, Watson got better and better and demonstrated his ability to thread a killer pass on numerous occasions, great goal by Hutchinson, Williams at 17 looks a real talent and has improved rapidly in just 10 days since Notts County, the guts of Brown and Watson to take pens and score the best pens of the lot (behind Kazim’s). Sibley showed flashes of what he can do, thought Joz did ok and Allsop after a shaky start was excellent in goal. Then we get to Ravel, we saw the genius with the equaliser but I was more impressed how he was straight to the youngsters after the shootout. Only thing missing was for young Jack to get a goal, thought he struggled on his own up top but really intelligent runs at times, he just needs a goal. 
 
Thought Rooney spoke brilliantly after the game. Whatever his motivations he definitely cares and he’s committed. I also saw a young exciting footballing side tonight with lots of bottle that I can get behind.
We’ve seen a glimpse of what the future looks like tonight and it’s very encouraging. If Mel sorts his poo out then everything is there to become a force again at this level in the next couple of years. If he doesn’t then we might have to give them all away.
 
COYR ???????

More of this please.

They all wore the badge with passion and pride

Plenty to pick through about that performance, but I'm really enjoying the us against them mentality that's being born out of adversity. I think Rooney has used it to his advantage. 
The performance was no classic, but the young players seemed to develop an entire year within 90 minutes. Watson, in particular, started with a few miss passes but then was pulling the strings towards the end of the game. Ebosele is far from a polished footballer, but my word - he has a go. All I see is the Michail Antonio that was at Reading all those years ago. If he can follow a similar trajectory that would be great. 
Hutchinson has a lot of technical ability. Similar to Bird in a lot of ways. I thought Brown showed a bit of promise, although I'd like to see him with Davies rather than Forsyth. Sibley is just unbelievably talented, but I wish we got him on the ball a bit more. The ability as soon as he touches the ball just jumps off the screen. The first touch, the way he quickly changes the direction of the ball. We need to develop him because he's got a special talent in a role that we need a special talent. 
Ravel showing a lot of maturity and that's probably down to the team mentality. He has a real chance here and what a start. It's the best possible start for him and he will no doubt start again on Saturday. 
The first 30 minutes were a rough watch, but after that we blossomed and a lot of the younger players deserve a lot of credit. It was on their shoulders and they showed a lot tonight. I'm really looking forward to Saturday now - I want to see what we can do this season!