3/1 To Win
Gary Rowett wants to see a similar performance when Derby County head to Craven Cottage on Monday, after his side beat Fulham 1-0 in the Sky Bet Championship Play-Off Semi-Final first leg.
Cameron Jerome struck for the fifth time in four games to secure a slender lead for the Rams to take to west London for the second leg.
After an impressive performance, Rowett is keen for his players to keep their feet on the ground and he selected the key areas for improvement ahead of Monday night.
He told RamsTV: “We stressed to the players that at the end of the night, we would only be halfway through the tie.
“Unless you are three or four ahead, then you know that the game is always going to be finely poised and you can see how much of a good side Fulham are.
“It’s half-time. It means nothing, the lead can be cancelled out in a minute and we have to play with the same control and discipline that we did tonight.
“We have to show more quality on the ball and that will be important. You know that, against Fulham, you won’t have as much as the ball as you want, so when you do, you have to make sure that you use it.
“Early on, we looked nervy and edgy and we have to use the ball a bit better.”
The stats will show that the away side dominated the ball but Derby kept their visitors at bay for the majority of the tie, and the boss was pleased with the discipline that his team showed, especially when dealing with Fulham’s key man.
“They make it very difficult to press high, everybody wants that for the whole game but it’s very difficult to do that,” he explained.
“Tonight, the discipline we showed and the way that, tactically, we controlled them was excellent, I don’t think they had many chances.
“Curtis [Davies] did a fantastic job on [Aleksandar] Mitrovic, there was one chance where they hit the bar, but there weren’t many other chances and it shows great discipline to do that.”
Jerome last scored in four successive games when he went on a five-match sequence with Cardiff City back in September 2005, and he is now one game away from equalling that record after another expertly taken goal.
Rowett was thrilled with the quality of the strike as well as the creation, but he admitted that he was disappointed that his side couldn’t find a second goal ahead of the away leg.
He said: “We made five or six passes and took the sting out of Fulham. Fozzy [Craig Forsyth] stepped in and it’s a lovely flighted, in-swinging ball and Cameron does what he has done so often.
“He bullies the centre-back and it’s a fantastic header.
“It’s difficult at 1-0 because you don’t want to open up too much and you don’t want to allow them chances, but it’s a shame that we couldn’t pick them off on the counter.
“I felt that we looked a real threat for the last 15 minutes and we really should have picked them off for the second goal.”
