Record Breaking Rams

Over the past few weeks, the media have increasingly speculated about which particular "worst ever" records Derby will break. Saturday saw an impressive hat-trick of: joint longest Premier League run without a win; first team to be relegated during March; the clubs longest winless streak.

The clubs new American owners General Sports Entertainment are quite big on "the match day experience" so I was disappointed not to see a hologram of Roy Castle appear at the final whistle, in the style of the absent Robbie Williams at a Take That concert. I can only think that the trumpet blast of "Dedication's what you need" put them off.

The game itself was billed "...THE WORST PREMIER FIXTURE EVER?"on Saturday morning (by a red top known in previous decades as The Daily Maxwell) due to the Rams well documented situation, coupled with Fulham's dire away record. The analysis after the game was not so harsh, proving that The Worst Premier Fixture Ever is most likely to be a mid-table stalemate in January rather than a match between two teams both going for victory.

Derby's goal bonanza also inched us further towards (or away from?) various low scoring records and a point is always cause for celebration. Interestingly, Tito Villa's two goals propelled him to joint top scorer in the league (he already had one) and with one of his rivals being a midfielder who left in January (Matt Oakley) he could well win an accolade of his own.

After the week he's had, Paul Jewell was probably quite relieved to have been playing Fulham. Judging by my trips to Craven Cottage, Fulham probably have the most genteel fans in the league and almost definitely the lowest numbers of NOTW readers per head. Therefore, there was no mass abuse from the visitors. If Derby had been hammered, the Rams fans might well have composed a few songs of our own. As it turned out it was an easy ride for the man known from his Bradford days as "Jagger".

So overall, not a bad day for the Rams despite our record breaking: a couple of goals, a point and most importantly a performance that if not brilliant, hinted that we don't need a complete new team. Carroll, Jones and Ghaly all showed quality whilst Villa and Sterjovski are doing their acclimatising now and should hit the ground running next season. Whether Ghaly will be here next season is anyone's guess. After his impressive cameo at 'Boro last week, Jewell said that if he kept it up we might sign him. In reality, if he keeps it up, the Championship won't be his best offer. It's just a shame Stubbs is still absent as the past fortnight might have seen us yield 4 points rather than 1.

S Spaceram

www.ramspace.co.uk