Louie Sibley says Derby County’s players are relishing the opportunity to test themselves against Championship opposition in Round Two of the Carabao Cup on Tuesday night.
Derby will host Steve Bruce’s West Bromwich Albion at Pride Park Stadium to compete for a place in Round Three of the competition (7:45pm kick-off).
Liam Rosenior’s side were 2-1 winners at League Two side Mansfield Town in Round One a fortnight ago with winger Tom Barkhuizen coming off the bench to score the winning goal in the second half.
Sibley, who started the game against the Stags, says the Rams want to enjoy a run in the competition alongside being successful in Sky Bet League One - but knows they’ll be up against a strong Baggies side who will be buoyed by their 5-2 thrashing of Hull City at the weekend.
The 20-year-old sat down with RamsTV ahead of Tuesday evening’s cup tie to discuss the 0-0 draw at Fleetwood Town on Saturday, Derby’s five League One games so far and his own aspirations for the 2022/23 campaign.
Reflections On The Draw At Fleetwood…
The lads are still a bit frustrated and we know we should have been more clinical on Saturday. We aren’t going to get too down about it because we know we created loads of chances, but we should have won the game. We can’t beat ourselves up about it, we need to move on and prove on Tuesday in the Carabao Cup and then against Peterborough on Saturday in the league that we can be clinical. We aren’t too concerned; we have goals in the team and we see it in training all the time. Once we get on a run, they’ll keep coming.
On Results So Far…
We know, as one of the biggest teams in the league, we need to be winning matches. We have that pressure on us and we know we have the ability in the changing room. We just want to keep working hard every day with the manager and his staff. I am sure, with the way we’ve been playing, we can go an unbeaten run. We are a bit frustrated we’ve not scored as often as we’d like to have, but we’re not too worried like I said earlier.
On League One…
We know that some teams will sit off us and we’ve spoken about it in our team meetings. We know we can’t just keep playing the ball side-to-side and instead, if the option is on, play forward and hurt teams. From the games we’ve played so far, we’ve seen where we can do better. It is about dealing with the challenges.
On The Carabao Cup…
It should be a good test for us and whatever side the manager picks, they’ll give their all. We beat Mansfield two weeks ago, which was a good tie to be fair, so we’d like to keep our run going in the Cup. We played against West Bromwich Albion last year in the Championship and we know they’re a team with quality. When we played at Mansfield a few lads that hadn’t started the first two league games featured and had a point to prove, so whenever you’re selected it is a chance to show what you can do.
On Himself…
As a player, you always have a point to prove to people. For me, I didn’t play too much last year so it’s about getting a run of games and proving to people what I can do. I feel sharp and I want to get off the mark in terms of a goal.
