Clearly, Derby were able to significantly outperform those stats to finish in the top ten, but the reality is that they generally conceded considerably more chances than they created throughout the season. Why was the situation allowed to drift so badly? The big one is Max Bird 's change from 41 all the way down to number eight, the Rams academy product wearing the number all pre-season. His red card against West Brom was rescinded, but days before, he aimed an obviously petulant tackle at Forest’s Tiago Silva and was booked – it was the kind of frustrated hack that obliges a manager to take you off. However, a loan move away would indicate that Cocu, who we’re told prefers to keep his favoured prospects close, probably doesn’t think the striker will make the grade for Derby. Cocu might have some room to manoeuvre if one of the young homegrown stars is sacrificed, but has said himself that selling the crown jewels would be the last option. It would be great if Marriott could prove me wrong and force his way into the starting XI on a regular basis – another possibility we can’t exclude is that he could be sold, to allow Cocu to bring in a player or two of his own. The West Brom game, with no shots on target at all, was the nadir, but Brentford, Cardiff and Leeds all comfortably merited their wins, too. - fans verdict on Derby County's latest signing, The Rams have landed 19-year-old former Liverpool striker Bobby Duncan, Confirmed - former Liverpool striker Bobby Duncan joins Derby County, Nineteen-year-old Bobby Duncan has signed for the Rams from Italian club Fiorentina, Derby County join Watford and Bournemouth in race for versatile star - reports, The Rams have been linked with former Reading defender Jordan Obita, ‘Hardest part’ - Derby County new boy on settling in, setting targets and the ‘massive’ task this weekend, Derby County entertain Tony Mowbray's Blackburn Rovers at Pride Park this weekend, Final piece of attacking jigsaw identified as Derby County are handed double boost, The Derby County headlines from DerbyshireLive. Barrow are back in the Football League for the first time since 1972, while it’s the first fixture between the two clubs since 1957. He didn’t want to miss four to six weeks of the season, he said, hence he gritted his teeth and got on with it – but the reality was that by and large, he was a shadow of the player he can be, becoming a perma-sub with very limited impact on the majority of occasions he made it onto the pitch. But when a remarkable eight Moor Farm graduates ended up on the pitch together at West Bromwich Albion, Cocu rebelled against the idea that it was anything to celebrate. Do we start on zero points, or minus three, four, six, even more? We can’t take it for granted that there will be new stars for the first-team every single season, but the intent is there and young players know that if they sign for Derby and work their nuts off, then the manager will give them a chance. Phillip Cocu 's side get the new season underway tomorrow when they play Barrow AFC in the first round of the Carabao Cup at Pride Park (12pm). Derby County have released the squad numbers for the 2020-21 campaign. Regardless of the EFL case, the club has got to cut costs post-Covid and the big man was one of the higher earners, courtesy of Steve McClaren’s “love letter” contract. … And the one which went on to promotion the next season. I see this as a black mark on Cocu’s maiden season. If your opponents plonk ten men behind the ball and you have it at your feet, what do you do? explains more about how we use your data, and your rights. The 2020–21 season will be Derby County Football Club's 137th season in existence and their thirteenth consecutive season in the second tier of English football, the Championship. For a player we all hoped could be a 20-per-season man, that goes down as a categorical failure. Derby under Cocu did not press high, allowing proportionally more opposition passes than they committed defensive actions (i.e. Knight was used on either flank, but as a natural box-to-box midfielder, he will run up and down the wing all day (and scored six goals this season) but is not a player with a trick. He has a cutting edge to his game that other players in the camp don’t and Cocu will, I assume, be planning ahead with the assumption that Sibley will be playing regularly as his number ten. Granted, the impression was given that we were skint last summer, only for Mel to green light shock moves for Wayne Rooney and Krystian Bielik, but in the wake of the virus, this summer feels like a different landscape entirely. Maybe it was boring-attacking, but that was because the opponent parked the bus. What we don’t want is a situation where one or more of them has to be sold just to pay the bills – but at least that is an option, in extremis. The former Blackburn and Birmingham midfielder said the opportunity to take on the Rams’ “top players” in a “wonderful stadium” like Pride Park will be enough to get his squad pumped up for the fixture.