3/1 To Win
Wayne Rooney was once again delighted with his players after Derby County recorded an impressive 3-1 home win over Hull City on Tuesday night.
The victory saw Rooney’s side move to within four points of Reading, who are directly outside the Sky Bet Championship’s bottom three, as they maintained their impressive run of form on home turf with a comfortable victory.
After surviving a couple of early scares as Hull pressed for an early opener, Derby took the lead after 19 minutes as defender Craig Forsyth marked his 250th appearance for the club with a bullet header from Jason Knight’s excellent right-wing cross.
A second goal followed shortly before half-time as Festy Ebosele’s cross fell kindly for Tom Lawrence inside the six-yard box to net his ninth goal of the campaign.
Ebosele netted his second goal of the season to make it 3-0 just after half-time with a fine low drive, before Forsyth turned a left-wing cross into his own net to pull a goal back for the visitors.
Derby were full value for their victory as they picked up a seventh win from 15 matches in front of their own fans this term.
Speaking to RamsTV after the final whistle, Rooney said: “I’m really happy and I thought the performance was very good.
“I actually didn’t feel we started that well in the first 10 minutes, maybe, but then after that we grew into it.
“We felt we could cause them problems down the sides and we did that. We asked Festy Ebosele to stay out wide and to try and isolate them and get into one-on-one situations; we did that brilliantly.
“With a bit more care with the final cross and final pass we could have got a few more goals, but I thought it was a very good performance overall.”
Derby scored three different types of goals and Forsyth’s opener in particular delighted Rooney was it was one the Rams had worked on in training.
It was the same with Ebosele’s strike, his first at Pride Park, as the side moved the ball quickly into an area where Rooney felt they could hurt the Tigers.
Rooney said “It’s great as coaches when that happens; we worked on it.
“I asked Fozzy to be more positive when the ball was on the other side and make back post runs and get in the box because he’s a threat with his height.
“It was the same with Festy’s goal, it was something we’ve worked on and focused on over the last few days because we knew there was space in behind their defence.
“We knew on the counter-attack we would get one or two opportunities and then it’s about being clinical with them. It was a great pass from Tom Lawrence and then a good touch and finish.”
Polish international Krystian Bielik made his first start since suffering a serious knee injury in January of last year in the game.
He got the vast majority of the encounter under his belt and Rooney was pleased with the midfielder’s display.
He said: “I know how Krystian plays and he likes to drive forward, but I asked him to be more disciplined today.
“I wanted him to stay in the middle of the pitch and for Max Bird to go forward a bit more but stay in the middle of the pitch and have a disciplined performance.
“Where he is such a plus for us is picking up second balls, and not just winning them but having the composure to knock it down to his team-mate.”
Derby are back on the road on Saturday in their latest Championship fixture as they make the journey north to face Middlesbrough at the Riverside Stadium (3pm kick-off).
