Wistaston Ram

Thought we looked more aggressive today, but then it's easier with Collins up front. Hourihane always a bit on edge! But just as obvious was the game management, we took 'considered' throw-ins from the first few minutes, and controlled the game better in the second half.

Maybe we need to be nastier on the pitch but still tidy up afterwards?  No need to take a dump in the dressing room (except at Leeds maybe).

Level of communication? What was communicated to me loud and clear was the new owner was prepared to use a massive chunk of his own money to save the club that was on the verge of extinction, that’s all the communication I need for a while and I don’t really feel I should be demanding more especially to allow me to pick apart his plans to move us forward away from the cliff edge

Personally I don't see why we need to grill the guy that SAVED the club from extinction,  just be grateful we have a club, as a fan he's not going to do anything knowingly that will damage us, so he doesn't need to 'fob' us off as some have said, he's done his bit, now it's up to us to do ours and support the team

We do lack aggression on the pitch. We press and then stand off once we get within 3 yards of the player in possession. There’s no intention to actually tackle. We are then weak on the ball and get pushed off or lose aerial challenges. It’s a serious problem in this squad. Took until Dobbin came on on Tuesday for us to actually press and put a tackle in with speed at the end of it. 

Maybe we need to be nastier on the pitch but still tidy up afterwards?  No need to take a dump in the dressing room (except at Leeds maybe).

Maybe we need to be nastier on the pitch but still tidy up afterwards?  No need to take a dump in the dressing room (except at Leeds maybe).

A random post quoted above. If unhappy at the flux recently just look back at certain periods of this thread - euphoria of first couple of days of July (yes it was that late) and total despair when the yank pulled out. 
Cannot believe how fans seem to be forgetting. 

Had to suffer an anti-money laundering course at work this week. Sports-washing was discussed as a current risk area. We were ripe for it generally. We are so so so lucky to be discussing Paul Warne as manager 

Approximately 4,200 tickets left so should be a decent crowd of between 27 and 28K (with 3K BR fans). Hope the majority are entertained!

Wippee! Another completely inexperienced ref lined up for his big day out.
Match Officials
Martin Coy will take charge of Saturday's contest and will be assisted by Anthony Da Costa and Marc Wilson.
 
The officiating team is made complete by Lee Freeman, who is on fourth official duties.
Coy has been in the middle for just four games so far this season and one in Sky Bet League One. He's handed out 10 yellow cards, one red card and awarded one penalty across those four matches.

Approximately 4,200 tickets left so should be a decent crowd of between 27 and 28K (with 3K BR fans). Hope the majority are entertained!

Yes, it was over 13 years ago when Nigel Clough was manager. He didn't really make that big of an impact at the time if my memory serves me right.

Really cannot remember when Barry Bannon played for us.  Assume it must have been briefly on loan from Villa?

Wildsmith  6.0
Chester 6.0
Cashin 7.0
Forsyth 6.5
Mendez-Laing 7.0
Smith  6.5
Bird 5.0
Hourihane 5.5
Roberts 6.0
Sibley 6.0
Osula 6.0
McGoldrick 6.0
Dobbin 6.5

If I can join in on the post match chat and give an away fan’s perspective…..
I enjoyed the game, but only in the way I enjoyed our 0-0 at Accrington earlier this season, I enjoyed watching two teams battle it out with loads of endeavour, even if there wasn’t much creativity on show. I enjoyed watching my beloved little old Exeter playing in a proper stadium against a proper club with proper fans. And I enjoyed singing my heart out for the lads until I now sound like Barry White.
As for the game, if I was a Derby fan I would be disappointed. You were the better side and the referee was poor for you, amazing for us. I didn’t think our keeper should have been sent off due to the ball going left and our covering defenders, but he certainly should have been booked and a free kick given. Amazing decision - as were lots of goal kicks / throw ins, especially the one in the last minute which was just in front of us. Hilarious.
I thought you looked a solid side, you just couldn’t create much in the last third, so although I thought you were the better side you didn’t really trouble our keeper, apart from the free kick which drew an excellent save from him. 
The reason we celebrated the final whistle so much was not only that we’d come to the home of a genuine footballing ‘big club’ and got a point, but we’ve had horrendous defensive injury problems in recent weeks, two of our players are staring down the barrel of a court appearance after their actions on Saturday night (I’m on their side by the way), we’ve had a new manager for 24 hours and we’ve got a team full of academy graduates. 
Finally (thanks for humouring me), what did you make of our support? I’m always interested in the other team’s view of us - did our numbers surprise you? Could you hear us? Can never tell with stadium acoustics. I thought your support was great considering how low you are in the football league compared to your history and also considering it wasn’t the most exciting game to watch.
Anyway, thanks for letting me join in. I might pop back when we play you at home next Spring. Good luck for the rest of the season. COYR (works for Reds and Rams).

It seems so anachronistic for Jimmy Hagan to have been at the Baseball Ground in charge of Benfica. He had been at Derby County so long ago that he would have chatted to Steve Bloomer when Bloomer was the groundsman. I doubt if he had any fondness for the Rams. He had been allowed to go to Sheffield United even though Derby must have realised how good he was. He went on to have a great 20 year career for the Blades. It was a bit like when Man United let Giles go to Leeds.  Sometimes managers get rid of players against the long-term interest of their clubs. It is often a case of a personality clash.

I don’t think Brian Clough put many people on a pedestal but I’m sure he would have respected Hagan. He performed wonders at Peterborough. His time at West Brom wasn’t as successful. In fact, his players went on strike in January of 1964 because he wouldn’t let his players wear tracksuit bottoms during training. Those of us of pension age will remember how cold it was that winter. When Hagan drove his car into a canal some of these players jumped in to rescue him. The others probably thought "Let him drown".

Below in the Youtube link at 5:57 you can see the canal he drove his car into. It was next to West Brom’s old training ground. The clip is from a documentary from about 1962 called “The Saturday Men”. It was supposed to be about the life of an average footballer but many of those players were far from average – e.g. Bobby Robson, Don Howe, Jock Wallace, etc.
It’s fascinating to see how much industry there was at that time. The background in the clip seems to be full of factory chimneys. This has got nothing to do with Jimmy Hagan but I find it hard to understand how we were so poor then when we were manufacturing so much. Today when we make nothing the situation seems reversed.
 

This is the story about the strike :
https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/incoming/gallery/baggies-refused-wear-shorts-343350
This is about Hagan’s crash :
https://www.pressreader.com/uk/black-country-bugle/20180815/281861529341413
 

What has been noticeable this season is that Sibley has been far more restrained when provoked by opposition players, which is a good thing although it is a balance, as some have pointed out his aggression (channelled correctly) is one of his strong points. At Accrington, I noticed that their no.6 took every opportunity to wind him up and it was good to see he just ignored it and let his football do the talking.  Disappointing to see  he followed up with quite poor performance against Ipswich, but personally, I would stick with him as he can cause havoc in the opposition's defence when on song. 

What has been noticeable this season is that Sibley has been far more restrained when provoked by opposition players, which is a good thing although it is a balance, as some have pointed out his aggression (channelled correctly) is one of his strong points. At Accrington, I noticed that their no.6 took every opportunity to wind him up and it was good to see he just ignored it and let his football do the talking.  Disappointing to see  he followed up with quite poor performance against Ipswich, but personally, I would stick with him as he can cause havoc in the opposition's defence when on song. 

Oh mr warne, you’ll see we’re torn
(and some are getting quite forlorn)
Smith, Hourihane and Bird have class
and Didzy, he just loves to pass
 
So get the best out of our roster,
don't come in like some imposter
hoofing balls north, east, south, west 
let’s see our squad play at its best 

The fans deserve a fine display
of skills at pride park - and away 
they’re honest and deserving folk 
please please don’t make us play like Stoke 
 
So here’s the rub:  a manager should
work out what each player could
deliver, if he’s at his best 
... then make it happen. That’s the test 
 

Back in the car, waiting for the traffic to die down. We were nowhere near as bad as some on here have suggested, but it was galling to lose to an avoidable error. Oh well on to the next game.

Ipswich are looking the team to beat this year but you have a settled squad and way of playing that’s been built over nearly a full calendar year now and he was backed in the transfer window to sign the players he wanted. You have the right squad balance and depth, it’s easy to see why you were preseason favourites. 
Derby on the other hand only had 5 players in June, 1 week less preseason than everyone else. We had to cobble a team together under transfer restrictions and now the new owner has assessed things we’ve changed manager and having to adapt to his style. A lot has been made of we’ve signed Hourihane and Collins and we have one of the leagues strongest squads, we are a mix of 30+ or 21 and unders, the strike force last night had not played professional football before this season and it showed. We have no depth, we actually don’t have a genuine right back at the club. But it is what it is, we nearly didn’t have a club a few months ago and we now have to work to a business plan which means we cannot spend transfer fees, which is why only Barkhuizen and Wildsmith are the only players in the 23-28 age bracket in our squad.
That being said while neither team was at their best last night there wasn’t a lot between the teams which gives me hope. First half of the season was always about staying in touch, we hope and expect to come on strong in the second half of the season, i think looking at this league we have a very good chance of playoffs, we will likely have too much ground to make up for autos. Playoffs would be reasonable for us considering where we were in preseason. Promotion would be great this season, but realistically it might take 2 years, as long as it doesn’t take 3 like you boys ?
 
 
 

Our quality or lack of in the final third was really damning. Got into a few promising positions first half and some in the second but then the final ball either through player skill or composure was absolutely non existent.
If the tactic is that were going to score goals by pressurising the opposition and forcing mistakes then Ipswich didn't read the script last night and other teams might not be so generous too.
The only really difference between the 2 teams is that we gifted Ipswich a goal and a penalty on silver platters whereas we huffed and puffed but they to their credit gave us nowt. We were never going to score from our own endeavours if we had played for another 90 minutes. 
Some of the comments about Warne already on here I imagine from the Rosenoir sycophants are really quite pathetic if not tediously predictable.
Obviously the novelty of winning 2 away games which we never even looked like doing under Rosenoir isn't enough for them but hey ho fill your boots lads if it makes you happy. 

Back in the car, waiting for the traffic to die down. We were nowhere near as bad as some on here have suggested, but it was galling to lose to an avoidable error. Oh well on to the next game.

Back in the car, waiting for the traffic to die down. We were nowhere near as bad as some on here have suggested, but it was galling to lose to an avoidable error. Oh well on to the next game.

Back in the car, waiting for the traffic to die down. We were nowhere near as bad as some on here have suggested, but it was galling to lose to an avoidable error. Oh well on to the next game.