Dex

All right. I'll do last season, and counter with the season before last the young lads were a year younger, and we'd just had our academy ravaged having come out of admin. If they weren't good enough for last season, then they wouldn't have been ready the season before either. In the first half of the season, we had a three goal lead 6 times. Half of them had late goals (after 60th minute), and of the remaining 3, two were against decent opposition (P'Boro and Barnsley) and the other game we did bring on academy players. 12th August Burton 0-3 Derby (6' 78' 84') - Late goals. 26th August Peterborough 2-4 Derby (all 4 goals in the first half, but against some decent opposition). 31st October Derby 4-0 Northampton (All 4 goals pre 49'. I'll give you this one but we did bring on both Fornah (68') and Brown (77')). 11th November Derby 3-0 Barnsley (goals scored by 63rd minute, again against decent opposition). 5th December Derby 3-0 Fleetwood (FL Trophy game, two goals scored after 77') 9th December Leyton Orient 0-3 (last goal scored in 79') So in the course of the season, there was really only Exeter and Port Vale where it would have been reasonable to blood a youngster. I can't speak for the decision at the time, but I stand behind my point that there really wasn't much to go for especially considering we were hunting down automatic promotion.

Without wanting to get dragged into a rabbit hole here, since January we have been 3 goals up 4 times. Of those, two of them we scored our third goal in the 85+ minute. Feb 13th: Exeter City 0 - 3 Derby (Bird, 24'; NML 52'; Barkhuizen 62') March 2nd: Derby 3-0 Port Vale (OG 5'; Gayle 44'; Sibs 58') March 9th: Bristol Rovers 0-3 Derby (Gayle 55'; Barkhuizen 58'; Waghorn 89') Derby 3-0 Leyton Orient (Wilson 10'; Bradley 18'; Bradley 86') The rest of our games were draws, losses or a win by 1 goal (with the single exception of Fleetwood Town away on January 6th which we won 1-3). It's not a lot to go for. EDIT: And of course Carlisle at Home. No idea how I missed that one 😄

Really insightful data there, and it definitely tells a story. The only thing I'd suggest counter to this in Warne's favour is that the job he had vs the job Rooney had were completely different and our appetite for risk was very much different. Are you going to risk giving youth talent a go in the first team when you're pushing for promotion and risk finishing third, or when you literally can't play any other players and are practically relegated anyway? I don't think many Derby fans would have appreciated the long game in starting Oduroh over Nyambe or Wilson at the back end of last season when we were trying to make a gap over Bolton. I suspect that if we have a good season in the Championship, and end up well out of the relegation zone so that it frees up some games where we can play youngsters 'risk free', Warne would take it. I'd be interested in knowing at what point in the season Ozoh, Chirewa and Springett picked up their time in the first team as I suspect it's when Palace, Wolves and Norwich had nothing much else to play for. I have done no research on this though, and I'll leave myself open to ridicule for being wrong 😄 - just a feeling. Edit: Thought about it a bit more: I suppose even if they got minutes earlier in the season, those clubs haven't had as much riding on the outcome of the season as well established clubs in their respective leagues. Their academies also hadn't been ransacked and so they could be more certain that the players could come in and do a job. I think we're just in a place where the good youth players that would have come into our first team around about now were sold by Quantuma for 50p and a Twix, and it could be a year or two before we can redevelop a new batch of good youth players. At the same time, we "should" be able to establish ourselves as a Championship team that can afford to take the risk with a youth player.

Steve Bruce replacing Keogh at Blackpool. Give a 'listen' to his final post match interview So yeah... Listen.... Like you say... Yeah... Listen.... So yeah... Listen. Some things never change. 😆

He's our keeper A mighty keeper He's Sweden's number 1. He's our keeper, A mighty keeper, Jacob Widell Zetterstrom Zetterstrom Zetterstrom Zetterstrom (to infinity or repeat :D)

I think we might be forgetting just how ravaged our academy was through administration. We're probably not blessed with the levels we need to even be worth putting them in the squad. We were forced to sell the players that would probably be just about be ready to make the first team such as Kaide Gordon (now 19 years old), Omari Kellyman (now 18 years old), Dylan Williams (now 20 years old) and even Luke Plange (now 21 years old). They'd been in the academy system long enough and might have even broken into the squad earlier than expected. Without those talents though, we're having to rebuild from around the U16s. I always thought it'd take about 3-4 years before we started getting some players back through again. Dajaune Brown is showing some signs, but it's still early days. I just don't think we should rush it.

I think he was air waving for a yellow card for a nothing foul in midfield. Then proceeded to whinge about everything and everyone throughout the course of the game.

Zetterstrom was massive, and a will quickly become a fans favourite. I understand the point that if we'd conceded it would be a different game. I think us fans can get quite anxious at the minute (I know I definitely was during that first 20) and it would have been incredibly tense in the ground. But in reality it probably would have been a case of conceding a goal, and playing a lot better immediately afterwards as we've done quite a lot over the past season or so. I still think we'd have won because they had no answer once we pushed Ozoh up the pitch.

I said to the guys around me in the East Stand that once we scored, Bristol started to look 'ratty' all across the park. And it's not too surprising. They are an established but progressing Championship team and were coming to a newly promoted side who have spent a lot of time this season on the back foot. They were all over us for 20 minutes, should've scored at least once and everything was going to their plan until we change our midfield position and pretty much immediately scored. Then we just started smashing them in midfield and they looked perplexed. I think Bristol came to Pride Park with an arrogance that it was going to be an easy game, and just lost their heads when it started to slip and they couldn't get it back. It surprised me as well though - we haven't been that dominant in midfield in years. I don't think anyone saw it coming.

What does success look like? i.e. survival? Top half? Promotion? Primarily survival. But it also has to come from the playing style. If we stay up by the skin of our teeth having sat back and defended for 90 minutes every game, I wouldn't say that's a successful season. Because, what's going to change for the next season? Conversely, if we went down, but gave it a good go with enough progress in the style that we could use it to ride our way back up, then in the long run it's not too awful. But to be honest, I can't see how we'd go down if we maintain the progress in the playing style, so it's a moot point. When is this to be judged? i.e. September, Christmas, end of season End of the season. What would failure look like? i.e. not winning league, mid table, relegation Relegation. And as above. When is this to be judged? As above. End of the season. Playing style by mid-November. In case of failure, would you change manager? Yes - the game on Saturday showed we have the ability to play fast paced football through the middle of the park. If we can't sustain that level of performance with this gaffer, perhaps another one could. What would you expect the new manager to achieve that could not be done via the existing? In what timescale? I'd equate it to what Stevie Mac initially did with Cloughie's team. It'd be a tweak in mentality and tactics to get the best out of the players. Not necessarily to turn us into the best team, just to optimise to our strengths. Who would we wish to replace and at what cost? What if he is unavailable? Hard to say at this distance. There'll be some changes in managers by then. Rather depends who's available. And as it is I wouldn't want to change anything.