Apart from Chris Martin who is of course ineligible, all the lads appear to be fine. There's no great love for Derby, what with the lost promotion scandal in 1983 and more recently Chrexit. Setting aside these grievances though, this is the second team on the trot that we face and who are coming to the game after a victory against QPR. In Derby's case it was also the first home win for new boss Gary Rowett. So an already tough game has just become tougher. We know Rowett's style just as much as he know's ours and withought doubt he'll get men behind the ball, be aggressive (or as some would say, with 'high intensity') and try us to stop playing football. They do have a couple of key injury doubts however - to full back Marcus Olson and midfielder Bradley Johnson. For us, expect Tim Ream to be back. Otherwise it's the usual conudrum about the usual two spots so straight in with the selection to start: ............................Button................ ..Fredericks...Kalas....Ream....Malone.. ..........................McDonald........ ............Cairney..............Johansen... ......Aluko.............Cyriac........Kebano...
This will be a real test. As you say I suspect some in your face tactics from Derby and they are still holding faint hopes of a play off position. We've been off pace recently so will be interesting game. I agree with your team, perhaps a place though for Ayite. There will be a number of ups and downs from now on so we just need to keep calm and deal with what ever comes up - supporters included.
I'd have Kebano in the centre with Aluko and Ayite either side, keeping Cyriac on the bench. I agree with Malone at left back, though I'd be tempted to try Sessegnon in place of Ayite in the attacking three, just to shake things up a bit. Whatever the forward line, if it works well tonight, I'd continue to leave Martin out for the following games barring injuries.
Looking after things tonight is Jeremy Simpson. We've seen him only the once this season - the 2-2 draw with Cardiff at the begining of the season, when he booked Michael Madl. In fact Cardiff games, before tonight, are it so far as Jeremy is concerned; the solitary other game of ours he ref'd was again at the Cottage when we beat Cardfiff 2-1 at the end of last season. This is his first season proper doing Championship games and obviously he's determined to show the powers that be he means business. In 34 games so far this season Jeremy has awarded 145 yellows and 5 reds. His most productive match, only just mind, was the Reading v Ipswich game in September and out came 9 yellows; 5-4 in favour of Reading. The actual match result was 2-1 for Reading - all 3 goals were penalties!
Wow .. how unexpected ... Piazon is back. ............................Button................ ..Fredericks...Kalas....Ream....Malone.. ..........................McDonald........ ............Cairney..............Johansen... ......Aluko............Piazon........Ayite... And that line-up surprisingly makes the bench seem stronger .. Sessegnon, Kebano, Cyriac ... with this lot to boot - Bettinelli, Sigurdsson, Madl and, the invisible man, Petsos
Could say unlucky in the first half or conversely, could say blah, blah defending. Anyway a snap shot of the main moment, if you don't count Button's penalty save -
More "What Ifs" than anything else after tonight - and quite a few aimed at Button. So will leave the second half with another Ayite snap shot -
Disastrous defending from Button & Ream for 3 of their goals. Not the first time this has happened this season to those two. I think with Button & Ream in our defence I'm always going to feel nervous in a game no matter how well we are playing.
Why is it always Derby! I hope this is the 'get it out of our system' game and we can press on. I did thing for once that the international break came at the right time for us. Players were looking a bit tired etc and we'd come back wired and fired! Quite the opposite it seems. We need everyone to hit some form and push on.
