RAMS INSPIRED BY COMEBACK HERO FORSYTH
Veteran lauded after 379 days on the sidelines
DERBY County manager Phillip Cocu paid tribute to comeback kid Craig Forsyth as the injury-plagued defender helped to inspire a fifth straight home win.
Forsyth, 30, hadn’t played a match for 379 days as he battled back from the third serious knee injury of his career.
But deployed in an unfamiliar role at centre-back, the Scotland international didn’t put a foot wrong as Martyn Waghorn’s first-half strike put woeful Preston to the sword.
“What a game he played,” said the Dutchman, whose fast-improving side climbed to 11th in the Championship, their highest position since early August.
“I have used him a lot in training as a centre-back. His height, vision, age and experience – it is the perfect position.
“Today I just said to him, ‘Enjoy playing the game. Enjoy being back where you want to be’. Don’t think ‘I have to be brilliant’. Just play. Because all the work, all the days and months – this is what it was all for. That is exactly the way he played and he had a very good game.”
He did, but it wasn’t difficult against a Preston side bereft of the form that had propelled them to second in the table.
Had the visitors dispatched the game’s first big chance, things might have been different. But after Daniel Johnson’s closerange effort was blocked, Patrick Bauer – hardly the ideal recipient of a rebound – hacked wildly into the stand.
After that, Derby assumed complete control, searing through Preston’s rearguard time and again. Tom Lawrence went clean through, dithered,
then blasted straight at Declan Rudd. Chris Martin, deft and diligent in the hold-up role, teed up Mason Bennett for a volley that practically snapped the crossbar.
Even the loss of Bennett and Graeme Shinnie to early injuries didn’t disrupt the Rams, with the two substitutes – George Evans and Martyn Waghorn – combining to force another excellent stop from Rudd. From the subsequent corner, Waghorn chested Curtis Davies’ flick-on into an empty net.
“It was probably the best 45 minutes I’ve seen from the team,” added Cocu, who took over from Frank Lampard in the summer. “It was a great combination of technical execution of the plan and showing the fans that we enjoy playing as a team. The movement, the touches – that’s what you want to see in a team.”
Preston, usually so fierce in the press, looked like someone had slipped a prozac into their pre-match brew. “We lost too many headers, too many battles,” said Preston boss Alex Neil.
“And that’s all over the pitch. Derby were faster, sharper, better. We didn’t compete. But as I said to them at half-time, it’s too easy for me to come in shouting and bawling. The players are honest, they know when they’ve been poor. What we needed to do was fix the second half.”
The introduction of the ever-classy Paul Gallagher did plug a few holes, but it was Derby who should have extended their lead.
Krystian Bielik excelled in defensive midfield, blending destructive physical power with a deceptive delicacy of touch. His first-time ball wiped out the entire Preston defence, and Waghorn should have done more than waft a shot into the arms of Rudd. Preston did eventually muster a response, though it was all rather frenzied and frantic.
Tom Barkhuizen turned in from a goalmouth scramble and was denied by an offside flag. The former Morecambe man then smashed over from eight yards.
The biggest worry for Derby was their own goalkeeper. Kelle Roos flapped and flailed at pretty much everything, and Jordan Storey very nearly capitalised with a late prod against a post. In the end, though, victory was comfortably secured.
“It did improve second half,” said Neil. “But by then, we were chasing the game. It’s a blow, but nothing is won or lost at the moment. What we’ve got to try to do is take that disappointment from today and make amends down the road.”