So it was time to relive the dream and see my team climb to countless successes under Clough Jnr., right? Wrong. This was not down to Clough being a bad manager despite what rival fans sang, the board gave him no money to spend and forced him to sell our best players to reduce the wage bucket. Clough could only scour the loan market and non league teams for talent, shoving together for three successive years a patchwork team capable of just staying above the dreaded relegation. Then it happened, as is growing at Leeds, a murmur of discontent grew, suddenly fans had had enough, we had no investment and Clough seemed perfectly happy with this. Fans turned against the manager who realised that he was baring the brunt of anger that should be aimed at the money holders, eventually admitting he could do nothing without money. It was then the board had to rethink or face riots.
Sure, they had reduced the debt heavily putting the club on its feet, but it was time to loosen the purse strings, and Clough was supposedly given a treasure chest of money to spend. Well, maybe not, as Clough could only have spent about 2 million which is pennies in this division, and yet still fans grew hopeful. We had a younger team with players capable of surviving more comfortably.
Yet pre season was dreadful and the team succumbed to loss after loss against weak opposition in friendlies, and the taunts of relegation were yelled by Leicester and Forest who were certainly more eager to splash the cash. Yet Derby showed resilience to beat Birmingham 2-1, and picked themselves up at their Carling cup defeat to beat Watford 1-0, suddenly fans were content, at least we had started strong, but it couldn’t last right? Wrong again. We shocked Blackpool with thorough determination 1-0 to go 3rd, and produced a confident show to power to a 3-0 home win against Doncaster to go joint 2nd with Southampton.
So what now? Will the same show begin where Derby desperately chase other teams until safety? Or will Nigel Clough’s army show the pride and spirit shown by fans for many a year, turning determination and passion into results, claiming victory over doubters and proving he is worthy of being his father’s son? Maybe, maybe not, and yet one thing for sure, Derby have an impressive fan base in the championship who never give up on their team, who don’t glory hunt or hide their passion for the black and whites, cause Derby fans know that one day we will return to the premiership, and when we do… well we can’t do any worse than 11 points, can we?
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