Derby County - Season 2022/2023
After waving the white flag early doors last season, our stint in
League One was always going to be one of change. The aging rear guard all left for pastures new, high earner
Tom Lawrence left for
Reading for £250,000 which was decent given he only had 21 days left on his contract, he would have taken the 25% decrease in wages due to us being relegated but he was far from irreplaceable.
Louie Sibley joined
West Ham for £8M rising to just over £10m, the
Hammers even offered to loan him back for a season once the deal had been struck so we snatched their hands off.
Summer signing
Erik Palmer-Brown came, saw, conquered then left for
Charlotte for £5.5M, an easy sacrifice given our past form with financial mismanagement, you just can't turn that down for a free signing.
Akin Famewo (Loan - Norwich),
Harry Toffolo (£190k - Huddersfield),
Tyler Walker (£275K - Coventry) and
Dane Scarlett (Loan - Tottenham) were just some of the success stories in what was a very rewarding campaign that saw us break records left, right and centre. None more so than freebie signing and new number one,
Matija Sarkic (£34K - Wolves) who broke a club record for most clean sheets, a record that hadn't been bettered since the 1970's.
We shall not be moved indeed.
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https://i.imgur.com/tuyiaQb.png
An immediate return and we do so in much better shape than last season both on the pitch and financially. A nice £12M transfer budget available too with a huge excess in our wage budget. Prudent. :cool:
In the domestic cups our luck wasn't quite with us as
Mansfield raced into a 3-0 lead to knock us out of the
FA Cup first round, 3-2 while
Bradford's 91st minute equaliser gave them a lifeline in the
EFL second round before they went on to eliminate us on pens. At least there was the
EFL Trophy though, we eased through our group with 1-0 win over
Fleetwood, a 0-0 penalty victory against
Manchester City U23's and
Salford 4-0.
Mansfield were first up in the knock out rounds, a 2-0 win gained a small measure of revenge for the
FA Cup loss, a victory by the same score line saw us defeat
Tottenham U23's but we came undone in the quarter finals as
Dylan Levitt's sole strike was enough for
Man United U23's to progress at our expense. They went on to win the whole thing beating
Rotherham in the final.
Promotion was always the sole goal but it was nice to do so by recording a club record most points in a season (98), most league wins (30), most clean sheets (28), in fact, we hadn't conceded a single goal in
League One until match day 8. The same day our unbeaten run ended as it happens. Screw you
Rotherham.
We did have to wait a while to claim the title officially despite being so far ahead, this was largely in part to winning only one league game throughout April, three draws and two defeats could have proven to be the ultimate bottle job if Doncaster and
Wayne Rooney's
Huddersfield had capitalised.
Next season is still up in air, it could be nice to see if we can challenge for the playoffs with a few additions but equally, a move could be on the cards as this doesn't have to be a one club save.
All in all though, top effort. On we go.