Most and least improved...

[Chester40]

...since Cocu started his tenure?  

As a coach who do you think has really benefited and blossomed most in his time here and who has regressed quickest ? 

Keogh has obviously fallen from grace but I think we can agree that is irrelevant of the manager. Bielik was our most expensive signing and flattered to deceive. Roos is really struggling to claim the place that was his to lose. 

But I think... Marriott has really tumbled down the pecking order most. I had such high hopes for him and whilst its in part due to injury he just looks lost now and even his finishing is suffering. 

On the up.... Martin has forced his way back into the reckoning and Wisdom seems to be preferred to other's in two different positions now. Lawrence is slowly coming of age finally...maybe?

Lots of youngsters breaking through.. but Bird probably of everyone has enjoyed the fastest trajectory, looks set to be ever present. 

[RadioactiveWaste]

Best - Bird, Knight, Lowe, Lawrence - although the maturation of the young players may be a case or right place right time, but at least they're on the pitch.

Worst - Marriott, Zoon, Bogle, the magnetic bad luck force

[RamNut]

Roos - I thought he played well v Man Utd. If we just let him play instead of criticising every little thing he might yet be ok.

bogle - blows hot and cold. Hopefully he gets it together consistently soon.

fozzy - has done well, but can’t play centre back except in emergencies.

wisdom - back to his best.

clarke - has improved massively from the nervous wreck at the start of the season.

lowe - should be good but not a natural defender.

davies - time to move on.

evans - another player who should be given a chance. Plays consistently well at the back.

bielik - too early to judge. A bit over eager perhaps.

malone - currently out of the picture. 

bird - massive improvement

knight - no-one had heard of him until frank picked him as sub in the play offs. A talent.

lawrence - improved 

holmes - also improved

Waghorn - grafts and has a reasonable goal return.

marriott - still a good player if used correctly, but there doesn’t seem to be a role for him.

martin - good when he’s good. Not sure he’ll be staying

jozefzoon - very disappointing 

Sibley - hasn’t played enough, but hopefully will get more opportunities 

shinnie - squad player. At his best he plays like Bryson. At his worst he plays like butterfield.

huddz - time to move on.

Whittaker - promising

buchanan - initially promising. Maybe more from him next season.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Comrade 86]

The kids are flying. It's like a production line these days. Much credit to Wassall and Cocu I reckon.

From allegedly being 'finished, gone, over the hill', Chris Martin has made a few on here look properly daft and while not able to play every game, his performances, both to the eye and statistically speaking, have been excellent.

Clarke has looked to be steadily improving, especially his passing and Duane has been hitting new heights (no pun intended!).

Tom Lawrence looks a totally different player from prior seasons and even early this one. Andre Wisdom too looks in better form than at any time since his first season here.

Conversely, Bogle and Lowe's form has seemed to plateau a little recently, defensively speaking at least. Roos remains inconsistent and Marriott is for me, the biggest disappointment in years. He's a mile off the player we saw glimpses of last season and I've completely run out of excuses for him.

Mostly a positive shift then so Phil gets a B+ on his report with the promise of better to come.

[Andicis]

Marriott and Waggy have both disappointed me. Waggy hasn't been clinical when the chances fall to him, and Marriott is never fit, and even when he is fit he's generally crap, fans seem to rate him more highly than he deserves, probably off the back of the Leeds game. 

Most improved is probably Duane Holmes or Max Bird. Holmes has started adding more end product to his game, whilst maintaining his forward drive and momentum. We've missed him. Max Bird is just a totally transformed player, went from not being ready when Cocu joined to being one of our best midfielders.

[Parsnip]

14 minutes ago, RamNut said:

shinnie - squad player. At his best he plays like Bryson. At his worst he plays like butterfield.

Reported.

---

Prohibited Content

Personal insults/profanity towards other members, players, staff, media or anyone connected to Derby County Football Club.

 Libelous content containing or constituting a libel.

---

Just because he's Scottish doesn't mean he doesn't have feelings.

#bekind

[Tyler Durden]

10 minutes ago, Andicis said:

Marriott and Waggy have both disappointed me. Waggy hasn't been clinical when the chances fall to him, and Marriott is never fit, and even when he is fit he's generally crap, fans seem to rate him more highly than he deserves, probably off the back of the Leeds game. 

That's why they're both playing for a mid table Championship side though isn't it 

[Andicis]

1 minute ago, Tyler Durden said:

That's why they're both playing for a mid table Championship side though isn't it 

Well yes, but we should still hope for more shouldn't we? 

[Tyler Durden]

32 minutes ago, Andicis said:

Well yes, but we should still hope for more shouldn't we? 

I know what you're saying, it frustrates the beejesus out of me too when Waghorn is on a 1 on 1 and I know deep down that inevitably he will miss

What's the alternative though? We've got what we've got and unfortunately have to like or or not tolerate that as we don't have anyone better 

[Andicis]

42 minutes ago, Tyler Durden said:

I know what you're saying, it frustrates the beejesus out of me too when Waghorn is on a 1 on 1 and I know deep down that inevitably he will miss

What's the alternative though? We've got what we've got and unfortunately have to like or or not tolerate that as we don't have anyone better 

Well yes, but I'm not saying we have another alternative. But in the summer, then comes our chance to address the issue. I'm just saying at the minute they've both disappointed me.

[Big Trav]

I personally think waggy has been good for us this season. Missed chances aside the work he does off the ball is invaluable. He should be on the wing imo.

[Comrade 86]

Poor old Waggy. I know he can frustrate but he works his socks off, is definitely a good lad to have around, never let's his head drop and then there's the 13 goals scored so far this season. All of this despite his off the field issues too.

We're a tough crowd!

[Dean (hick) Saunders]

Quite likely Waghorn will end with about 16 goals this season. That is more or less as good as he can manage (ie what we paid for).

Marriott I would sell if we can entice a decent offer. (He is kind of Adam LeFondre type). Up front on his own he is clueless. If we aren’t going to play to his strengths we need to replace.

[Millenniumram]

Most improved:

Obviously the young players that have broken through and established themselves in the side this year have been a revelation. But we obviously don’t really know how good they were before this season, not in terms of their quality at first team level anyway. Maybe they just needed the chance to show what they can do. So all credit to the manager for giving them that chance of course, but In terms of this thread, we need to look at players who were already playing for us regularly last season. So for me, most improved is Tom Lawrence. He’s been like a new player since the turn of the year. Before he was a pretty expensive bang average championship winger, who pulled a rabbit out the hat occasionally and worked hard, but was far too inconsistent and more often than not very wasteful. Now though, he’s looking like the top level championship attacking player that we thought we were getting for our 5 mil. His decision making has improved 10 fold - he no longer runs into dead ends so much, his linkup play is much improved, and he’s a lot more reliable tracking back too. Not to mention an increase in his goals and assists output as well. It’s been a massive turnaround that’s made people like me who doubted his ability at this level look like muppets, so full credit to Cocu for helping him reach his potential. I suspect the influence of Rooney has helped a little too.

Least improved:

Have to briefly mention Dowell here, who I know wasn’t great at Sheff United, but he looked so bad here it was scarcely believable. As bad as some of the midfielders we had in that terrible late 2000s period, and one of the worst players I’ve seen in a Derby shirt. Quite why we couldn’t get anything out of him I don’t know. Maybe Cocu’s coaching of him was terrible and made him a worse player, or maybe he just had literally no footballing ability whatsoever to begin with. Either way up, he was terrible but luckily he ain’t here anymore, so I’ll give my least improved player to someone who is - Jayden Bogle. Seems slightly harsh as he’s still very much a good player at this level, but he has regressed from last season which is both disappointing and a little concerning. Just doesn’t seem to have the same confidence anymore going forward - too often he seems to lack conviction when taking players on and ends up losing the ball as a result. Maybe Cocus more reserved managerial style doesn’t instil the same belief in him that Lampard's more all action style did. I don’t know, all players are different. But he’s certainly not been quite the same player this season, he’s made more mistakes at the back than before too. He’s a young lad still however, so I’m sure it’s just a blip in his development and he’ll get back on track soon.

[Comrade 86]

11 minutes ago, Millenniumram said:

Most improved:

Obviously the young players that have broken through and established themselves in the side this year have been a revelation. But we obviously don’t really know how good they were before this season, not in terms of their quality at first team level anyway. Maybe they just needed the chance to show what they can do. So all credit to the manager for giving them that chance of course, but In terms of this thread, we need to look at players who were already playing for us regularly last season. So for me, most improved is Tom Lawrence. He’s been like a new player since the turn of the year. Before he was a pretty expensive bang average championship winger, who pulled a rabbit out the hat occasionally and worked hard, but was far too inconsistent and more often than not very wasteful. Now though, he’s looking like the top level championship attacking player that we thought we were getting for our 5 mil. His decision making has improved 10 fold - he no longer runs into dead ends so much, his linkup play is much improved, and he’s a lot more reliable tracking back too. Not to mention an increase in his goals and assists output as well. It’s been a massive turnaround that’s made people like me who doubted his ability at this level look like muppets, so full credit to Cocu for helping him reach his potential. I suspect the influence of Rooney has helped a little too.

Least improved:

Have to briefly mention Dowell here, who I know wasn’t great at Sheff United, but he looked so bad here it was scarcely believable. As bad as some of the midfielders we had in that terrible late 2000s period, and one of the worst players I’ve seen in a Derby shirt. Quite why we couldn’t get anything out of him I don’t know. Maybe Cocu’s coaching of him was terrible and made him a worse player, or maybe he just had literally no footballing ability whatsoever to begin with. Either way up, he was terrible but luckily he ain’t here anymore, so I’ll give my least improved player to someone who is - Jayden Bogle. Seems slightly harsh as he’s still very much a good player at this level, but he has regressed from last season which is both disappointing and a little concerning. Just doesn’t seem to have the same confidence anymore going forward - too often he seems to lack conviction when taking players on and ends up losing the ball as a result. Maybe Cocus more reserved managerial style doesn’t instil the same belief in him that Lampard's more all action style did. I don’t know, all players are different. But he’s certainly not been quite the same player this season, he’s made more mistakes at the back than before too. He’s a young lad still however, so I’m sure it’s just a blip in his development and he’ll get back on track soon.

 

 

[Philmycock]

I thought Bogle played well against Man U

[B4ev6is]

I felt tad sorry for Marriott this type of football does not suif he thrives from through balls or runners alongside him looking getting the ball to him.

Chris martin getting better and better with every game he plays in and has 7 goals from 18 apperances. 

Tom Lawrence of late been on fire

Jasion knight his hunger to win the ball and make something scored a few himself.

 

[jono]

Knight and Bird .. kids .. now men .. absolutely the best thing in the last 5 years

most of the others it’s about form, although I have liked Holmes from day 1 and and am really chuffed he’s adding goals and shutting up the nay sayers. Cracking player. 

and yes Lawrence .. finally seeing the player we thought we had bought

Waggy . Love him to bits .. he’s like I think I’d want to be if I could play a bit. Never a star, but the biggest heart on the pitch, always gives it a go and with occasional purple moments....like .. woooah did Waggy just do that ? well I never !
 If there was a fight, a battle or a comrade needed I’d pick Waggy to be on my side

[Comrade 86]

5 minutes ago, jono said:

If there was a fight, a battle or a comrade needed I’d pick Waggy to be on my side

If there was a fight I'd stand back and laugh as Waggy cheerfully dismantled them all the while with that big soppy grin on his face. Once heard a farmer use a phrase to describe another farmer he knew who was widely respected as a proper hard man if you were daft enough to start on him. He said he was the the type of man who could 'run down a hill with a cow under each arm' ? That's Waggy.

[europia]

Bird looking a great prospect for championship football. Sibley also looks a real talent as does Knight. Holmes improving again this season. Hopefully Lowe and Bogle will improve defensively as they are still not quite good enough in that department. 

Really disappointed that Marriott seems to have regressed this season. Always thought he was the natural goal grabber that we haven't had in years. For whatever reason, that seems not to be the case.