DIRE RAMS RUN OUT OF BREATH
WHAT should have been a Burton funeral turned into a requiem for Derby’s promotion hopes.
Burton are on the verge of dropping out of the Championship, but they are going with a fight.
On a weekend when relegation might have been sealed, battling Burton instead got their first home win since September – 17 games ago – to knock Derby out of the top six.
Rams fans turned on their team and manager Gary Rowett. Angry at what they were seeing, they bellowed ‘You are not fit to wear the shirt’ as Burton bossed the game.
Derby are now a point outside the top six with a game in hand.
It is critical they make up ground with successive home games against fifth-placed Middlesbrough and Cardiff, who are chasing automatic promotion.
They are also away to Aston Villa in their run-in and finish, probably very nervously, with a home game against Barnsley.
“I’m not surprised the fans were chanting at the end. I’m not surprised they feel they’ve wasted their hard-earned money,” said Rowett. “I’d feel exactly the same. They were right to do that.
“If you don’t compete and you don’t work hard enough and if you don’t show a real desperate desire to get in the play-offs, then you are not going to win games.
“I’ve said to the players the question is, are we going to give every drop of sweat and every ounce of effort to win games at this stage of the season?
“We are going to have to find a way to win probably three of our last four games.”
Derby had looked as if they had pulled out of a disastrous run that saw them drop from second place to fifth. But now they’ve again lost two on the bounce and the pressure is on.
Burton had so many injury problems they could only name six substitutes. But the Brewers had themselves a party.
“There’s a glimmer for us, just a glimmer,” said Albion boss Nigel Clough. “We’ve got Sunderland next and then Bolton. I think whoever loses out of us and Sunderland next week will go.
“Our aim is to get the results ourselves over these last few games that make the others at the bottom play. We are fighting.”
Derby reacted quickly the first time they went a goal down, but when they were hit again just before half-time there was no chance of a quick recovery.
Rams fans massed at the end where the first two Burton goals went in booed their team off at the break.
Burton’s fans were just stunned. This was only the third time this season their side had led at halftime.
Liam Boyce’s goal in the 24th minute was a simple tap-in from a few feet, set up by Luke Murphy, and his second goal since his club-record £500,000 move from Ross County.
David Nugent has also been short of goals, getting his first for four months when he headed in Tom Lawrence’s cross five minutes after Burton had gone ahead.
But the better ideas came from Burton and when Murphy attacked Derby’s defence he hit a screaming 44th-minute goal.
Lucas Akins made it 3-1 after Hope Akpan’s shot had been saved and Derby’s dismal day was complete when Matej Vyrda had an 89th-minute penalty kept out by keeper Stephen Bywater.