Next Game – Derby County (away)

Lee Holmes

But it is played two, won two at Pride Park and both significant games. It is difficult to believe now that just under four years ago we made our first appearance there in the FA Cup as a 2^nd Division club and put the Premiership club out with a fully deserved 1-0 win courtesy of an Andy Cooke header.

We couldn’t have imagined that not long after that we would be going there for league games but that is exactly what has happened as Derby suffered relegation and almost financial ruin. The relegation came in 2002 as they tried everything including three different managers in an effort to stay up.

They came down with Leicester and Ipswich but to their credit, and despite the fact that they were on the brink, they did not go into administration last season although in the end they had to sell numerous players on the cheap. The likes of Deon Burton, Brian O’Neil and Bjorn Otto Bragstad departed for next to nothing although they did bring in some reasonable money with the sales of Mart Poom, Chris Riggott, Danny Higginbotham, Malcolm Christie and Francois Grenet.

Manager John Gregory also went under a massive black cloud that saw him suspended for some time. They even replaced him with George Burley whilst still suspended which was enough to convince everyone that he was finally on his way.

They ended last season in 18^th place after hoping for a quick return to the Premiership and so far this season has been no better, in fact it has been worse, and they are currently in the bottom three along with Bradford and the Franchise.

The squad has been further cut with a whole host of players moving on in free transfer deals just to get them off the wage bill. Amongst them are Rob Lee, Warren Barton, Craig Burley, Georgi Kinkladze and Fabrizio Ravanelli.

Burley has brought in some experience with former Villa midfielder Ian Taylor and Michael Johnson from Birmingham and currently has two loan players from other clubs in the division in Peter Kennedy (Wigan) and Danny Dichio (West Brom)

But he has also turned to youth and there is no more exciting prospect at Pride Park right now than winger Lee Holmes. the 16 year old has won himself a regular place in the side recently and has now got 14 league appearances under his belt. And Holmes will line up alongside another 16 year-old in Tom Huddlestone who will be looking to make his 18^th league start for the Rams.

There has been a change at the top with a new board buying the club and having congratulated them on not going into administration last season then this time in a confusing day they did so and were then bought hours later.

Things are still not good though and they have gone eight league games without a win, the last victory at Bradford at the end of September. Their only home win of the season, in nine attempts, was against Watford.

Last week though they looked to be on the way to a victory when the two loan players, Kennedy and Dichio, both scored in first half stoppage time to give take them in at half time 2-0 against Burley’s former club Ipswich.

But the Tractor Boys came back in the second half to earn a draw but manager Burley saw the positives. "We have to take heart, particularly from the first half performance," he said after the game.

"Last season we were totally outplayed by Ipswich but today we held our own just as we have done against some of the division’s top sides."

Derby lined up: Lee Grant, Pablo Mills, Youl Mawene, Michael Johnson, Peter Kennedy, Tom Huddlestone, Ian Taylor, Simo Valakari (Candidio Costa 79), Lee Holmes, Danny Dichio, Lee Morris. Subs not used: Lee Camp, Steve Elliott, Marcus Tudgay, Adam Bolder.

Click HERE to see all Derby's results this season.

Past Results in the last 20 years

Click HERE to see more results against Derby going back to a 1-0 Turf Moor win in 1889.

One from the past

A win at last

Derby 1 (Bolder) Burnley 2 (Blake, pen Barton, og)
Nationwide League Division One – Saturday 7^th September 2002

Lee Briscoe, Paul Weller and Ian Moore lead the celebrations after Warren Barton's own goal winner

Bottom of the league and without a win in five games, just a single point in a 0-0 draw against Crystal Palace to show for 450 minutes football.

To add to that Paul Cook is still suspended, Gareth Taylor and Dimitri Papadopoulos are away on international duty and Glen Little has been axed and put on the bench. Robbie Blake, the one dropped after playing in diving boots on the opening day of the season, has been recalled and after receiving the manager’s praises a week earlier Nik Michopoulos is axed following the signing of Marlon Beresford for a month. We are playing Derby who have just been relegated from the Premiership and they have made an above average start to the new season.

It seems it is hardly worth leaving town but Clarets Mad made their way down there and in the betting booths inside Pride Park Burnley fans were making bets on Derby to win. And guess what, we came out and played just like we had in the previous five games. We had hardly got started before we found ourselves a goal behind from Adam Bolder.

We could have been behind earlier but Derby had missed two chances before Bolder’s eighth minute goal and we were struggling to adapt to a strange looking system with three at the back. The highlight of the first half was the fact that it ended with us only one goal behind and I’m sure the players were fearing the worst from Stan as they trooped in.

Now I’m not privy to the goings on in the dressing room at half time but I sure would have loved to have heard the goings on that afternoon. What we do know though is that the ineffective Lenny Johnrose came off, Glen went on, we returned to a 4-4-2 system with Glen down the right hand side and for the next 45 minutes we simply tore Derby County apart.

Derby might have scored in the first eight minutes of the first half starting but after eight minutes of the second half the game was on its head as we scored twice to go in front. Taking centre stage were Glen, Robbie Blake minus diving boots and Warren Barton the Derby captain.

Glen and Robbie linked up in a way we hadn’t seen before and the Derby defence simply had no answer. A piece of magic from Blake saw him go down in the box for a clear penalty. With Taylor missing (was he really missed?) Blake got up to take the penalty and score his first Burnley goal.

Attacking towards the end where the Burnley fans were the game had changed, the support led by Rocky was incredible, and almost immediately it was 2-1 after more superb work from Blake convinced Barton to turn the ball into his own goal. This was the Blake that Stan had paid out a million for earlier in the year and he was ripping Derby to bits just as he had done to us playing for Forest two seasons earlier.

That was the end of the scoring but Burnley were in total control for the rest of the game and with Ian Cox and Arthur Gnohere outstanding at the back there was never going to be any need for Marlon to even break sweat.

It was all so confusing though and left everyone wondering just which was the real Burnley – months later the season ended with the question still largely unanswered.

The teams were,

Derby County: Andy Oakes (Lee Grant 67), Warren Barton, Chris Riggott, Danny Higginbotham, Richard Jackson, Adam Bolder, Rob Lee, Adam Murray (Lee Morris 69), Paul Boertien, Branko Strupar, Malcolm Christie. Subs not used: Brian O’Neil, Ian Evatt, Gary Twigg.

Burnley: Marlon Beresford, Dean West, Ian Cox, Mark McGregor, Arthur Gnohere, Lee Briscoe, Paul Weller, Tony Grant, Lenny Johnrose (Glen Little 45), Robbie Blake, Ian Moore. Subs not used: Nik Michopoulos, Alan Moore, Andy Payton, Matthew O’Neill.

Referee: Flood Warden Andy Hall (Birmingham).