Roo off to chilling start as Eze fires cheeky equaliser
IS this what it’s going to be like, freezing your whatsits off watching your team struggle to get a point?
Well wrapped up, Wayne Rooney sat on the bench on his first day as a coach and endured this draw.
Rooney didn’t look as smart as QPR boss Mark Warburton in his strikingly white trainers and Derby weren’t as sharp either.
Warburton claimed the Rooney factor helped his team.
He said: “We used some of the press comments that we were cannon fodder today. I read one statement which was basically, ‘Derby couldn’t have a better game than today.’”
“The players are professional and they get angered by certain comments.”
A goal ahead through a Martyn Waghorn free-kick, the scorer then gave QPR an equaliser when he brought down the excellent Bright Osayi-Samuel four minutes into first-half added time.
Eberechi Eze put the penalty away and from then on Rooney watched as Derby ended a five-game winning home run with this limp draw.
The England legend had looked a little embarrassed when he went on the Pride Park pitch to be introduced to the crowd.
He almost got to the centre circle, waved, put his cold hands back in his pockets and was gone again.
Boss Phillip Cocu said: “He sat at the back of the dugout where it was about three degrees warmer.”
Cocu gave keeper Ben Hamer his Derby league debut but lost Krystian Bielik injured before kick-off.
Waghorn lifted his dead ball over the wall in the 23rd minute.
Rangers deserved their equaliser but Eze upset Cocu by breaking his run before scoring.
Ref David Webb told the Dutchman that if Eze had stopped just before his shot it would have been disallowed.
However, Cocu added: “It was an unnecessary tackle.
“The only thing Osayi-Samuel could do was look for contact and get the penalty.”
Rooney saw it and made a mental note.