3/1 To Win
Wayne Rooney has challenged his Derby County players to bounce back from their recent frustrating run of form when they play host to Barnsley on Saturday afternoon.
Derby will face one of their relegation rivals at Pride Park Stadium in their latest Sky Bet Championship fixture (3pm kick-off).
Rooney’s side will go into the game with the Reds aiming to halt a run of three successive losses.
The defeats at home to Millwall (2-1) and away to Luton Town (1-0) and Cardiff City (1-0) have left Derby eight points adrift of Reading outside the division’s bottom three with 11 matches remaining.
Despite their recent form, spirits remain high in the Derby camp as they look to achieve a remarkable feat of retaining their Championship status despite a 21-point deduction this term for entering administration and a historical breach of profitability and sustainability rules.
Rooney views the visit of Barnsley, who have been in good form of late and picked up three wins in their last four matches, as an opportunity for his side to turn their form around ahead of the run-in.
“We’ve got the probably the perfect game to come into; Barnsley at home,” Rooney told RamsTV. “It’s an important game to us and we have to come away with three points, it’s as simple as that.
“That is our mindset and we will go and attack the game and try and get three points. Being at home against a team which is around us, it’s the perfect opportunity for us to try and bounce back.
“Barnsley have got a few good results of late so we know it’s not going to be an easy game and we will have to be at our best.
“We need to be more clinical, that’s the one thing which has been missing of late. We need to be clinical in front of goal and when it really matters.”
He added: “I keep saying it, but the players deserve an enormous amount of credit for putting themselves in the position where it’s still possible for us to stay in the league.
“We know it’s made more difficult with recent results but after the season we’ve had and the players have gone through all they have gone through is a credit to them to be in this position where there is still a fighting chance.
“We’ll keep going, fight until the end and if we do it, it is an incredible achievement. If we don’t, then it’s still a great achievement for what the players have put in this season.”
Derby have scored once in their last three outings, which was an own goal against Millwall.
The lean spell in front of goal has coincided with the loss of skipper Tom Lawrence, who has just completed a three-match ban for his red card in the 1-0 win over Peterborough United last month.
Rooney is confident his attacking players can rediscover their goalscoring touch sooner rather than later.
He said: “We have created some good chances in recent games, but it’s just about taking them. I spoke to the players this morning and the message to the lads was: ‘you need to want to score’.
“It needs to mean everything to score a goal and that’s where we are at. We need players that are going to put their bodies on the line, going to be in the right positions and take chances when they come, so I’ve picked a team which I feel is capable of doing that.”
