DavesaRam

1 hour ago, B4ev6is said:

Give roony a break he is doing best he can with very very very limited means and efl not making easy for roony eathier not letting us use any of under 23s.

That doesn't excuse his "try not to lose" approach to football. He does it most matches, then makes changes which do liven us up. And despite finding out how to play front foot football, he goes back to safety first again. It finished the Bald Eagle's time at Derby after Steve MaClaren left for Manure. He went safety first, and took us from one of the most exciting teams in the Premiership to no-hopers in a very short space of time.

Surely, against a team shipping goals for fun (?) the thing to do is go all out against them? We missed a huge trick there, today.

Starting a game trying not to lose, (even trying not to lose by too many) against a team that has shipped 7 goals in 2 games is a guarantee of a bad outcome. We were way, way, way too cautious, with no-one capable of a defence-splitter, and no-one able to stretch the Peterborough back-line. So 0-0 at half time was a good achievement. What that first half needed was a Sibley. And then CKR is badly injured - Rooney was almost in tears at that point.

But something good has come from it - Stretton played really well. I know there have been plenty on here criticising the kid, but if we didn't expect him to play the big, bruising centre-forward role, maybe we wouldn't be disappointed. What Stretton did do was play like a natural striker. Every time the ball was crossed into the box he was right there close to here the ball was heading. And when the ball dropped near him he scored a true striker's goal. Keep him playing like this and he will score loads. Try to turn him into CKR won't work.

Re the collapse - there are shed-loads of people on here sticking the knife into Sibley at every opportunity, but it is clear that we are nothing without him. I was shouting for a foul on him, not the other way round. He thought it was a clear foul, hence handling the ball. Perhaps he isn't aware that we only get crap refs, because during that part of the match, every time we got the ball in midfield we were getting brought down. He is therefore blamed for the goal which came from the free-kick, but in reality once the kick is taken, the team has to defend properly and they failed abysmally, especially Joswaick. Yet again, loads of people are critical of the Pole, yet it is somehow politically incorrect to criticise him. I don't now why - he still still making the same errors he got flack for last season. Can he not learn?

I am surprised that no-one has mentioned "Fergie Time"! Actually I for one am not too bothered by it, because most of that came from CKR's injury. The biggest worry is that we seemed to be out on our feet at the end - how can we be tired out this early in the season? I reckon that we had lost the game in our heads the moment the equaliser went in.

Where too from now? I have no idea. Any suggestions?

I think the nightmare start was because one team had clearly played together while the other one had not. Simples.    Ish! It left some with the mindset that we are awful and will really struggle this season. Well we will struggle, no doubt about that. But apart from the two mistakes we didn't perform badly. YEs Salford might have scored one or two more, but then we could have done the same! 

THE LADS DONE GOOD!

There seems to be two groups of people forming right now - those who have got it in for Joswiack, and those who are starting to have it in for Sibley. Joswiack got a load of flack on Saturday becaue his gaff in front of goal was what he was guilty of last season, so people are rightly annoyed that he doesn't appear to be learning from his mistakes, or to be developing. Last night his strengths of his defensive work and his play in midfield were there again, but last night he was looking to lay the ball off better on several occasions, so that is definite progress. Keep it up Kamil!

And Sibley - apart from his red mist tendency, many say that he is weak defensively. Yet for the first 20 minutes he was the one putting the challenges in. And later on, after our formation tweaks he found loads of pockets of space, and laid some terrific through balls on, parrticularly short ones through the defence. He was in line for man of the match until Ebosele's boots lit up.

There was another difference last night, especially for the opening stages. When Salford got the ball in defence they immediately shouted "Forwards", and off they went, transitioning through the phases really well. When we got the ball, we went all Chuckle Brothers, embarking on a series of about 20 passes sideways. "It's Cocu ball, Jim, but not as we know it" is apt, because it was just as turgid in terms of progress, but at least it was quicker than Cocu's offering. A second problem, which was highlighted earlier, was that while we were struggling to find a forward pass, Ebosele wa standing out on the wing totally unmarked, and with acres of space in front of him. Our response to this gift of an out ball was to turn and pass sideways to someone who was already marked, and it happened time and time and time and time again.

It wasn't helped by Louie Watson - he of the massive accolades. It seems he had been told how DMs play. Because of his desire for the forwards pass we all expected a George Thorne, but what we got was another Max Bird, maybe hinting that Max has been told to play like he does as well. The poor kids.

When Ravel Morrison went deeper it seemed to free our lad up, and suddenly the real Louie Watson started to play. Hence the accolades. And he never shirked or hid from the ball, instead standing with his arms aout wide saying "Pas it to me". Good lad!

The kids did really well - Hutchinson looks a potential star, Stretton looks like he knows what a striker should do, and if he had been given the ball in the right places, he almost certainly would have done well. As it happens he nearly scored from the only through ball he got to run on to. Well done, Mr Stretton! Williams looked good, and never gave up, despite Salford's seedier side being on display. How the defender wasn't booked I have no idea, apart from him not being a Derby player. Compare this with Ebosele's booking. Good grief. Sky described the foul on Williams as "It wasn't obstruction, it was the player simply getting in the way a bit". They forgot to mention that it was deliberate, with the intention of stopping Williams getting on the ball. Ie obstruction! The Sky pundits were at it again, blathering on about our penalty not being one, with the topic occupying them right up until Salford's non-penalty. They tried to show that there was no contact on Ebosele. The truth is that Ebosele's leg was moved by the contact, but the original camera view, from behind, shows the defender flicking his leg in between Ebosele's legs. It was deliberate, aimed at either putting him off balance, or even tripping him without it looking like a trip. Maybe if Salford concentrated on the football instead of the dark arts, maybe they wouldn't still be in League Two. 

What last night tells us is that although we might struggle his season, simply because of lack of squad depth, there is a terrific togetherness and never say die attitude amongst the players, and there are plenty of good signs for the future.

So, raise your glasses, everybody. Here's to a great future!

I think the nightmare start was because one team had clearly played together while the other one had not. Simples.    Ish! It left some with the mindset that we are awful and will really struggle this season. Well we will struggle, no doubt about that. But apart from the two mistakes we didn't perform badly. YEs Salford might have scored one or two more, but then we could have done the same! 

One David, there’s only one David, there’s only one David ..................

He’s one of our own, he’s one of our own,

DAVID,

He’s one of our own!

Thanks, mate. ???????

7 hours ago, Animal is a Ram said:

TLDR; Enough to be positive about, but the same old problems remain.

I wasn't expecting much from this game. I was just glad to be back, in my second home, with my Dad.

Given the circumstances, the performance yesterday was one deserving of praise. The defence looked largely untroubled. Impressed by Stearman, who I wasn't confident about. It showed a little that he and Curtis Davies hadn't played together, or even trained that much together, and didn't even know if they'd be playing until the day before, but otherwise they showed promise. Thought the full backs kept getting caught out, especially Foz as he was pushing so far up the pitch.

Shinnie was excellent, he was everywhere. Bird did okay, but needed to get on the ball more - need more of those razor sharp passes that set Watson and Sibley away. Thought the former was unlucky not to get a penalty. Lawrence was busy, work rate excellent, shame he wasn't that productive, but again unlucky not to get a penalty.

Definitely need another striker. A typical Colin performance, but sometimes you need something a little different. Jozwiak, I dunno. Feel like he just needs the confidence. One to go in off his backside or something. Went on a great run, but just kept... well... running, where there needed to be a shot or a final pass.

Such a Derby goal to concede though. But again, when the 2 CBs have barely been playing together, or weren't even sure if they were going to be playing... how do you work on set pieces?

A point was a fair result to me.

But none of that matters to me now. For sadly, my Dad passed away suddenly Sunday morning. A lifelong Ram who saw Derby win championships, beat European giants, drop to the third tier, nearly go out of business under Maxwell, and rise back again to the Premier League. I'm just so glad that, even with Derby in the situation they find themselves in, he managed to see one last game with me, one last goal. What happened on the pitch wasn't especially memorable, but the day definitely will be.

Up the Rams. Be kind. x

I’ve only just read your post. I  so sorry and my heart goes out to you. ❤️

At yesterday's match the Huddersfield players came onto the pitch from the South West corner of the pitch, obviously from different changing rooms. This is obviously something to do with Covid, but is somewhat puzzling, because we the two sets of players in close company, but more than that there were nearly 17000 fans breathing over eachother for over 90 minutes. 

Why are the Covid regulations such a joke?

Some great observations on here, thank you. The most common one is that it is good to be back!

It was a fair score, with the Rams producing far more than could honestly be expected, especially given that no-one knew who would be playing until midday Friday! And that our central defenders had never played together!

I must commend Tom Lawrence. Not for his going deep to pick up the ball, or for his hard work, but that although he got loads of good tackles in, there wasn't any sign of his hot headedness or petulance. Absolutely superb, especially as this ref seemed to book any Derby player that moved! Maybe Tom had got the ref sussed, which is why he didn't go down in the area. A friend in the North Stand who is a qualified ref (not sure if that is anything to boast about given what we have to put up with at Pride Park!) said both penalties were good shouts, especially the foul on Louie Watson.

Some are having a go at people on this forum for singling out players for criticism, meaning Joswiack. I think the reason is that it was clearly his weakness all of last season, and despite a good showing in the Euros he is still making the same gash mistakes in front of goal. It seems that there is no sign of having learned anything, or made any progress. Shame, as he holds the ball well, and works well in midfield, .............. until that final decision.

The issue of Sibley and how he is being used at Derby remains. His "game-changing" performance has been questioned because he didn't score and change the game. Really? We had just had 50 minutes with no clue as to who was going to even try to score, while Sibbers managed three really good shots. Maybe he should have done better, but actually he did much better than any of the other players whose job it is to shoot at goal.

I am furiosu about the yellow card he was given, because it was his first, and possibly only foul, almost as if the ref had been charge with carding Sibley. The same applies to Louie Watson, who was also carded for his first offence. He had been targetted, because he was clattered heavily three times in the opening 15 minutes or so, plus the penalty incident, with little done to cut out the heavy handed tactics by our opponents. As most said, he got it wrong in virtually all the 50/50 challenges, and allowed Huddersfield's strong arm tactics to go without restraint. One of the reasons CKR didn't produce very much is that he was being bear-hugged every time the ball got near him. That he did some good things is credit to him. 

So - we weren't anything special, but everyone seemed committed to the cause, and battled hard, producing more than we could have expected. And it is clear that the summer break has meant that the refs hadn't lost their edge - they are still crap. I reckon there is reason for hope, at least some hope, which is way better than I had thought.

The main thing is that it is good to be amongst fans again, even though the Rams administration (can I use that word now?) made a mess of the ticketing. They promised to keep our seats available for season ticket holders, but had actually sold our seats from under our backsides, so we hardly knew anyone around us. The upside is that we now get to know even more Rams fans than we did before!

That's two of our up and coming young hopefuls out with injury and we haven't kicked a ball in anger yet. What kind of footballer are we breeding these days?

5 hours ago, oomarkwright said:

Judy Collins-Send in the clowns. 

They've been in for a few years already!

1 hour ago, i-Ram said:

McCleary does highlight another important point.

He does point to another bodged, vindictive, decision by the EFL (including rushing out a statement at midnight, and raising the prospect of the Rams/Wycombe interchanging leagues) when a) at the time the appeals committee hadn’t completed and filed their report, and b) they hadn’t clearly sought their own legal opinion at the time that an appeal was of any merit. They clearly are not fit for purpose  / bankers (*delete as appropriate).

Delete the EFL is the most appropriate action.

On 24/06/2021 at 21:36, DCFC1388 said:

Without sounding arsey can people stop saying about delaying the accounts so the season starts and no relegation can happen.

The potential relegation is IF the EFL decide to appeal our 100k fine punishment and get what they want which is a retrospective points deduction.

Delaying the revised accounts has no baring on this & would only mean us being in an embargo longer than necessary.

Handing the accounts in early won't have any effect on the embargo, which will remain in place until the EFL decide to get their backsides into gear and actually look at the re-submitted accounts, which could be (a) immediately, or (b) any time they fell like it, with the embargo bing in place until the EFL have made their decision. No - silly me, they have already made their decision, what I meant was when they decide to announce and implement their decision.

On 02/06/2021 at 19:38, Tyler Durden said:

Guess education lessons on how to properly run a football club would be more in order.

Just like when you get caught speeding by the filth and you can either take the points and fine or go on a speed awareness course. 

Well you can unless you get caught again within 3 years of the last Speed Awareness Course. And, yes, I did - by one week! Coming back from Leeds on the M1 at 1am just after the "All Lanes Running" road works had been completed. But all the road cones and lane restrictions were still in place, as was the 40mph speed limit, for the entire 25 mile duration, and I drifted up to 50mph at the last set of cameras. It's almost as if the EFL were in charge of restoring the roads to normal in double quick time.

On 28/05/2021 at 22:58, I DONT MIND said:

I Like the one on the dark side, that famous Nottinghamshire couple: Burton Joyce.

So what is Bert and Joyce's surname?

The sad thing is the the EFL seem to be punishing us anyway because of all these colossal delays in declaring the results of the enquiry, appeal, panel, etc, which means we have been under transfer embargo several times already. And if this latest outcome isn't made before the transfer window shuts we will have been well and truly punished because we already don't have a squad because of all the out of contract players and all the loan players going back, and us having no time to replace them. We really struggled last season with what passed for a full squad. How can we compete when we could easily have hardly any players available?

Come on EFL, get your finger out.

9 hours ago, Jase116 said:

Surely we would be able to appeal if the decision went against us this time? If so this could drag on for a few more months yet.

I hsve just had a conversation with someone in a DCFC Facebook group and apparently the EFL have a rule that there us no right of appeal for us. So the EFL can appeal anything they want, probably whenever they want, and they are untouchable.

On 14/03/2021 at 14:10, Oldben said:

A good builder does not blame their tools.

Sibley is a young player, he was only given 20 minutes at the end of a match in which the entire team was struggling to produce a result.

The formation played was not the best one to pick to beat Millwalls team.

I am however not blaming Rooney for this, he is new to management, and is by no means the finished article.

I dont think Rooney has his full coaching qualification from the FA yet?

There were Derby players in the match against Millwall, who deserved to be picked out for criticism, obviously Waghorn (although he is playing out of his best position), but other players as well.

Jozwiack once again did not perform, but he is the wrong sort of player for the formation that Rooney selected to play yesterday.

CZM and Knight, did not perform that well yesterday.

You got that right. His best position at the moment is on the bench, or even better sat at home.

Incidentally, maybe Sibley hasn't produced of his best in the milliseconds he is given because he too is not in his best position, but stuck out on the wing.

On 08/03/2021 at 09:12, VulcanRam said:

I'm not sure whether its the management destroying his confidence; he's hardly been playing that well this season and nothing about his performances have demanded that he plays. Rooney will see whether on the training ground he is doing what he's being asked to do, and the answer is presumably not because let's face it, the midfield isn't really functioning atm and Rooney is happy to make changes so there's always places up for grabs.

You might as well start him on Wednesday given our lack of attacking guile or threat of late. Rooney has intimated it's his lack of discipline that's the reason he's fallen out of favour but seeing as the whole team is lacking discipline at the moment he's hardly alone. 

Quite like the idea of a diamond midfield with him at the tip and Shinnie at the base, and then two of Waghorn, Joswiak and Roberts, with CKR and Gregory up front. But that might well negate Byrne, who's our best crosser of a ball, and whoever is playing left FB.

Also it depends on whether Rooney wants to play Watson - I can't see both getting the nod. 

OI! Leave Waghorn out of this - we ar talking about players who can play and trouble the opposition.

It is interesting that we only really threatened Forest for the last 10 minutes or so, i.e. after Sibley had come on, and, curiously, after Waghorn had gone off. One wonders if we had started the match the way we finished it what scoreline we could have achieved? For me, there has been a lot of talk about there not being room in this team for Sibley. Well actually, there is. It is the place occupied by Waghorn. ? And no, we shouldn't be keeping Waggy in for his free kicks, because they have been poor for several matches. And his last corner hit the side netting at a height of about 2 feet. Time to make way for the Sibbers!

I managed to read it in just over 2 days over the Christmas week - yes, I know, its a bit “Johnny come lately”!

I actually bought a copy for my son. My wife and I had gone through one of those “what do you want for Christmas?” - “Dunno” - “What shall we get him?” - “Dunno” scenarios when I came across Pride, so I bought it, only for my wife to say “Look what I’ve got him”! ?.

So I quietly relegated it to birthday gift in March. Then I discovered that he’d bought the book for my Chrissy pressie - what a great son! He also dropped hints at his disappointment that the book wasn’t in his Christmas stocking! Ho hum!

It’s a great read, flows really well and generates a tremendous feeling of all of us being in this together, (unlike the Tory version of the phrase where we most definitely aren’t).

Some people have described the bad bits (should that be “lots”?) as painful, but to me it is all so real and enjoyable. I wish that there had been something this good about the Clough/Mackay years!

In the end, the book had brilliantly conveyed how Derby County has us all feeling like watching a Jim Smith / Mac 1 team ping 27 passes all over the pitch, ripping through the opposition, putting the striker through who scuffs his shot and the ball just slowly bobbles into the keeper’s hands.

Thanks for a superb piece of work, and here’s to many more. 

Bought a copy from my son, and with the lockdown I don't know if it will get to him, but I can't read it as he is a sharp cookie and will spot any slight thumb prints or other markings on pages. However, I suspect that my wife may have bought it for me, either for Christmas or for my birthday, which is just after New Years Day.

You've obviously spoken to loads of people for this, and I wondered how you first managed to get your foot in the door to actually access all these people, as most of us mere mortals don't get to meet any of them.

What about season ticket holders who haven't been allowed to renew? My son went online on the Tuesday they ended renewals, with the cut-off time at 12.00pm. He went on at 10.30, and they had already closed renewals. Will we get the matches as if we had renewed?

I started off on my laptop via HDMI, but can't get he sound to come through on the telly/av receiver, so have to make do with the ctrappy laptop speakers. Any suggestions? 

Regardless, I then went looking on the smart tv (I've hardly used the "smart stuff on it) and got on the DFCF site via the TV browser and it works treat - no delays, no fuzzy or jerky pictures (once it has been running for a few minutes). It seems that Rams TV runs about a minute behind Sky TV.

This works till about the 55th to the 60th minute, when the feed freezes, never to thaw again. Luckily I am armed with Radio Derby, and my son's SkyGo login!

Has anybody else been consistently frozen out?

Going to town and discovering yet again that everybody has gone there just to get in my way.

"Things that annoy me" threads that come to an end.