3/1 To Win
Goalkeeper Joe Wildsmith was delighted to help Derby County claim back-to-back home victories as Liam Rosenior's side beat Barnsley 2-1 at Pride Park Stadium.
An own goal from Tykes defender Conor McCarthy put the Rams ahead early in the first half, whilst they doubled their lead ten minutes before the interval as Nathaniel Mendez-Laing scored his first competitive goal for the club.
Josh Benson’s deflected effort pulled a goal back for Michael Duff’s side in the second half, but the Rams defended well to earn their second victory on home soil this season in League One.
Speaking to RamsTV after the game, goalkeeper Wildsmith praised his team-mates for grinding out three points, whilst he also offers his thoughts to Derby’s start to the campaign.
On The Win Against Barnsley…
The three points is the most important thing, especially at this stage of the season. To go 2-0 up and they get a goal back and it makes things interesting for them. We had to defend and put our bodies in front of shots, headers, saves, do whatever we had to do to get the three points. The boys were excellent today defensively. To put a shift in in this heat to keep us winning and keep us from dropping points is credit to them. Cash and Stears were excellent this afternoon and put their head on everything. Fozzy came on and helped us out as well but I thought the boys were excellent.
On The Defence In Front Of Them…
Stears is a great pro and has an exceptional career, there is no worry for him stepping in for Curtis and he showed that today. I don’t know if he is claiming the goal in the first half but he stepped in and played great. I thought he was excellent this afternoon, he came in and looked comfortable so it’s credit to him as a professional.
On The Playing Conditions…
It was important for us to use those conditions, especially in the way we play and use that to our advantage in terms of keeping the ball and making Barnsley run around more than what we had to. That showed in the first half and it showed in the second half as the game slowed down. We couldn’t get that many passes together that we wanted to but I thought we grinded together as a team and ground out the result and got the three points.
On The Start To The Season…
It’s three wins out of four so far, it would have been great to have four, but as starts go I think it’s a solid start and one we can improve on. I think the performances like the fans and we can definitely see, they are patchy. We are on top, then we’re not on top so if we can iron those bits out and put a good solid performance together and use the consistency and get those rolling then there is a great opportunity at this football club to do something special this year. The way we are playing in patches, if we can get that into longer periods of the game then we will a team that is right up there.
On Beating His Former Club…
In South Yorkshire, the football is really important so to get one over on a team that I used to play for on loan early in my career is that extra added incentive for me and it was great to get the three points today, as a Sheffield lad and former player.
