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Tag Archives: Cyrus Christie

15th September – Ince off the mark as solid Rams win again

15 Tuesday Sep 2015

Posted by petekobryn in Championship

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3pts, Craig Forsyth, Cyrus Christie, Derby County Football Club, Rams, Reading, Richard Keogh, Tom Ince

15th September

Reading                    0         Orlando Sa sent off 45+2

Derby County         1          Tom Ince 69

Games at Reading have proved difficult for Derby County over the years so this hard earned win is particularly pleasing.

An organised and solid Rams team took the points thanks to Tom Ince’s first goal of the season moving up to 10th place in the process.

This was a game of few thrills and spills, Ince’s neatly taken goal being our best chance, the only other incident of note being the dismissal of Reading’s Orlanda Sa just before the break for head butting Jason Shackell.

Paul Clement talked of surprising people in an interview before this game and made three changes to the team to keep both us and the players on their toes.

Lee Grant found himself back on the bench after his good performance at Preston with Scott Carson restored to the starting XI.

The rotating of keepers does bother me, the position more than most others demands stability but at the moment we seem to be recreating the era of England of c.1978 where Peter Shilton & Ray Clemence were selected in turn by Ron Greenwood.

Carson played well when called into action, pulling off one notable save from Oliver Norwood

Two other changes to the team that beat Preston saw the injured Chris Baird missing out and Stephen Warnock move to the bench to be replaced by Jeff Hendrick and Craig Forsyth with Bradley Johnson playing the pivotal defensive midfielder role in a 4-3-3.

Chris Martin took the captain’s armband in the absence of Baird in a move that appropriately reflects his importance to the team.

It was an energetic start to the game with the hosts winning a couple of corners in the first minute, but without causing any problems for the Rams.

Derby responded with a good move inspired by Johnny Russell’s good work, Russell found Chris Martin on the edge of the area but our No.9 wasn’t able to get the ball out of his feet and Jeff Hendrick’s shot, after picking up the ball, was deflected wide, though the referee did not award the corner it warranted.

The Rams were content to hold their shape and the game moved along without much incident. Jacob Butterfield unleashed a couple of powerful shots from distance, both blocked well by the Reading defence and just past the half hour Scott Carson pulled off an excellent save from a Oliver Norwood looper.

An increasingly quiet and uneventful half came to life just before the end of added time when Royals striker Orlanda Sa, fresh from a hat-trick against Ipswich Town last time out, head butted Jason Shackell (surely not a good idea?) following a niggle between the two players and was given a red card for his trouble.

The Rams were well organised in the first half without ever really threatening the home team consistently. Equally the Royals had not dominated though they flickered with more attacking threat and intent.

Derby made a good start to the second half, an early move culminating in Cyrus Christie firing a shot towards goal.

Just past the hour the Rams made a change, showing some aggressive intent, Darren Bent coming on in place of Jeff Hendrick.

In a quiet second half Bradley Johnson again showed well, putting himself about, playing some good passes and adding a physical presence to our midfield.

The Rams took the lead on 69 minutes with a well worked goal.

Jacob Butterfield played the ball to Chris Martin on the edge of the area and Tom Ince, who’d had a quiet game up to that point, popped up in the area to get on the end of a neat pass from Martin and poke in his first goal of the season.

The rest of the game played out without too much anxiety, Reading, despite being a player down, did press as the game came to its end, but without ever really carving out a clear chance.

Both of our full backs had a decent game with Cyrus Christie showing more of the form and confidence of early last season and Craig Forsyth galloping forward regularly; Fozzie also came close with a late chance blazing a first time volley just over.

Richard Keogh continued his impressive start to the season, composed and organised, his partnership with Jason Shackell increasingly the bedrock of our team.

Reading are a useful team with a habit of turning us over so this is an excellent three points won in a professional and workmanlike way.

Two away wins sets us up nicely for the visit of Burnley next Monday –  what price a nice 1-0 win courtesy of a goal from one J.Shackell ?

Played GD Pts
8 Nottingham Forest 7 1 11
9 QPR 6 1 10
10 Derby County 7 1 10
11 Reading 7 4 9
12 Charlton Athletic 7 1 9
13 Fulham 6 1 8

21st August – Johnny on the spot again for Rams at Blues

22 Saturday Aug 2015

Posted by petekobryn in Championship

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1pt, Birmingham City, Craig Forsyth, Cyrus Christie, Darren Bent, Derby County Football Club, Johnny Russell, Rams, Richard Keogh, Tom Ince

21st August

Birmingham City     1       Stephen Gleeson 45

Derby County          1          Johnny Russell 61

This was an exciting game with quality on show from both sides but the wait for a first win for Paul Clement’s Rams goes on.

The game statistics confirm that this was more of the same for Derby in that the Rams had;

63% of the possession

20 attempts on goal

Hit the woodwork four times

But only had Johnny Russell’s superb finish to show for it at the end.

Disappointment at not having won put aside, we looked better again in this game and there were long periods of the game where we attacked with tempo and created a lot of problems for the home team.

Tom Ince had his best game of the season so far, was involved throughout and hit the woodwork.

Birmingham played well and are a good side under Gary Rowett, and they will also be rueing the chances they had. Scott Carson had an excellent game in goal for us and made two great saves in the first ten minutes to keep the Blues at bay.

Richard Keogh had another good game and even a change of full backs for this game, with Cyrus Christie and Craig Forsyth brought into the team for this game, did not disturb that.

The swaps at full back were two of four changes made for this game. Johnny Russell started after his goal against Middlesbrough and Darren Bent made his first start of the season.

Chris Baird moved from right back to accompany George Thorne in the centre of midfield, Stephen Warnock and Andi Weimann dropped to the bench and the injured Jeff Hendrick and Jamie Hanson missed out.

We lined up in a 4-4-2 for this game and perhaps that determined the choice of full backs.

Stephen Warnock had a good game against Boro and Cyrus Christie was not even on the bench on Tuesday night but perhaps the mobility of Craig Forsyth and Christie determined their selection with more required from those positions to support the midfield.

Fozzie had a decent game all over the pitch, providing his usual threat going forward. Christie looked better going forward than defensively at times but this was an improvement from him.

After the home team’s energetic start the Rams hit a purple patch from the quarter hour onwards with opportunities in short order falling to Russell, Darren Bent, Bent (again), Tom Ince, Bent (again) and Ince (again)

The woodwork, good Blues defending, a fatal delay in shooting when the opportunity presented itself and rank bad luck all took their turn in preventing us from capitalising on these chances.

While the build up play was good there was a creeping sense of unease about not taking the chances when we had them in this most competitive of leagues.

The game quietened down towards half time but the Rams failure to close down on Stephen Gleeson as the ball was cleared from a corner cost us as his shot from distance took a deflection and found its way into the net to put the hosts ahead just before the break.

Birmingham made a strong start to the second half and came close to taking what may have been a decisive two goal lead heading a chance over and putting a shot wide – the Rams recovered though and hit another lengthy purple patch that lasted for a good twenty minutes.

Craig Forsyth hit a fine shot that Tomasz Kuszczak somehow managed to keep out and away from Darren Bent.

The pressure told for us just after the hour when George Thorne won a terrific tackle to regain possession in our half which in turn led to Tom Ince playing the lurking Johnny Russell in on the left of the Blues area.

With great power and precision JR fired into the roof of the net and we were level.

For a moment on 68 minutes it looked as if referee Lee Mason had awarded the Rams a penalty when Chris Martin went down in the area but, countering the old cliché that refs never change their minds, Mason then booked Martin for diving.

Was it a pen? – Seen them given….. Was it a booking? – Probably not.

It struck me as a Premier League ref in a Championship game feeling the need to make a “big” decision

Andi Weimann was brought on with twenty minutes to go replacing Darren Bent, but not before Bent had hit the woodwork again just after the equalising goal. On another night Bent would have personally bagged four.

The game closed with both sides still eager but both tiring to an extent.

Still unbeaten in the league but no wins for the Rams then.

The evidence on the pitch looks promising with development in each game – we are looking more threatening and our attacking game seems to be moving into gear.

We look particularly good when we move with high tempo.

Our old friends from Yorkshire next then.

                                                                   Played GD    Pts

  1. Wolves                                                       3       0       4
  2. Derby County                                           4       0       4
  3. Nottingham Forest                              3       0       4
  4. QPR                                                               3      -1      4
  5. Cardiff City                                               3       0       3
  6. Leeds United                                            3       0       3

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