Players’ mentality has been the key in hot form
ONLY high-riding Swansea City have picked up more points than Derby County in the last six matches.
Swansea have won five and drawn one for a tally of 16 points. Derby have won five and lost one, a tally of 15.
Of the 16 League games in which Wayne Rooney has been in charge of the Rams, first as interim manager and now manager, there have been eight victories and four draws.
He set out to simplify matters, go back to basics and make Derby more difficult to beat. Ten goals conceded in those
16 fixtures and eight clean sheets shows the players have taken the messsages on board.
But what does Rooney think has been the major change in the team?
“The big thing is the mentality of the players,” he said.
“I said after the game against Wycombe that I believe in these players. They are good football players. They have got a lot of ability.
“The first thing I wanted to get out of them was more character, more communication on the pitch among each other, and I wanted players working and fighting for the shirt. I feel I have got that.
“Once you have got that in your team it gives the players a chance to go and showcase their ability a bit more than they were able to.”
Derby face promotion-hopefuls
Watford at Vicarage Road tonight sitting 17th in the table and six points above the bottom three having climbed out of there only recently.
“For me, we just have to take each game at a time and assess where we are at after that game,” said Rooney.
“I have never been worried about us going down, getting relegated, the same way I can’t look and think ‘right, if we win this game we are going to get top half’ or anything higher than that because we just have to keep trying to win games. If we do that, we will end up where we deserve to.
“The lads are buying into what we are doing and the information we are giving them and it is the players who have to take the credit.
“They are taking responsibility, they are working hard each day in training and they are showing a great desire to play for this club and to win for this club, and that is all I can ask of them. “My job and the coaches’ job is to try to keep this run going and try to build momentum. The players deserve a lot of credit for the last two months.”
Looking to the Watford game, Rooney added: “It will be a tough game. Watford are a very good team and they are on a good run of form themselves but we have to go into the game confident and with a lot of belief. We are in very good form ourselves. We will be ready.
“It will be a different game to the last two games (Middlesbrough and Wycombe), a bit more tactical.
“Every week is a test. Our form against teams in the top six in the division has been very good.”