Ten minutes into the second half of Derby County’s final game of the season, the Rams were a goal to the good, and on course for promotion. Yet it was not the name of the goalscorer, another player or the manager that was ringing around a packed Pride Park. It was the name of a man who two years ago, was simply a devoted Derby fan. David Clowes.
Now of course, Clowes is Derby owner, the businessman having stepped in to save the club he loves when it was on the verge of liquidation. For that, he was already a reluctant hero. But after the events at Pride Park on Saturday 27th April 2024, he’s appreciated even more by his fellow Rams fans.
It was a day of high emotions for the thirty-thousand strong crowd, plus thousands more fans watching on tentatively around the world. Many woke up with butterflies in their stomach, minds racing with the scenarios that could unfold. Others had barely slept. Yet hairs stood on end before even going through the turnstiles. This level of nervousness hadn’t been felt at Pride Park since the days of administration. But unlike that time, Derby’s fate was in their hands, dependent on what happened on the pitch.
Head Coach Paul Warne made one change to the starting XI that won 1-0 away to Cambridge United a week earlier. Liam Thompson dropped to the bench with Max Bird making his 200th and final appearance for the club, having signed for Bristol City in January and been loaned back to the East Midlands for the remainder of the campaign.
Derby’s opponents were Carlisle United, already consigned to a last place finish. The Cumbrian side, managed by Paul Simpson, who was a winger in Derby’s last automatic promotion winning squad, would look to end their League One season in a memorable fashion. Able to spoil the party if they, and third-placed Bolton Wanderers both won.
The Rams nearly got off to a flying start when Nathaniel Mendez-Laing pulled the trigger inside the opening 90 seconds. But the man with the armband would send his shot from outside the box narrowly wide.
Derby led inside five minutes. Max Bird played the ball right to Kane Wilson, who came inside and returned the ball to Bird 25 yards out in the inside right channel. From here he curled a powerful effort into the right-hand side of the goal, causing Pride Park to erupt. It was almost poetic; one last crucial contribution from someone who established himself as a consistent presence through the most tumultuous of times.
Next, came a spell for the visitors. Carlisle had a couple of shouts for a penalty, which weren’t given by the referee, before a huge block on McCalmont from Player of the Season Curtis Nelson.
Derby would find the back of the net again just after the half hour mark, after some neat link up play between Adams, Sibley and Mendez-Laing. Adams drifted out to the left flank and played the ball inside for Mendez-Laing at the near post. He pulled the ball back for Sibley, whose shot was blocked before Ebou Adams acrobatically turned in the rebound. His celebrations were very promptly halted though, as the offside flag went up.
Kelly would go close for Carlisle when he got his head on Armer’s deep free kick, but Joe Wildsmith got his fingertips to the effort to and tipped the ball over the bar before Derby forced Carlisle back after the resulting corner. A great interception from Louie Sibley saw Nathaniel Mendez-Laing one-on-one with the goalkeeper, but Harry Lewis did brilliantly to dispossess the Derby man on the edge of the box.
Carlisle kicked off the second half, but Derby quickly won possession before attacking down the right. Mendez-Laing drove down the inside-right channel and crossed the ball to the back post for Collins, but the striker appeared to see the ball late as it whistled past his left foot.
Derby’s top goalscorer would get his 19th for the season in the 59th minute, though. From a free kick just inside his own half, Golden Glove winner Joe Wildsmith launched a deep ball to the left-hand side of the Carlisle box. It was nodded down by Sonny Bradley, setting James Collins up perfectly to rifle it home from five yards out with an exquisite touch and finish.
Now there was a sense of confidence around the stadium, as the volume was turned up in what was already a cauldron of noise. The flags adorned with important club figures past and present were waved with even more enthusiasm. Even as the acrid smell of smoke from a pyrotechnic filled your nostrils and hit the back of your throat, you didn’t care. There was a sense that the Rams really are going up.
With half an hour to play, there was only one more real chance of note. James Collins did brilliantly to win the ball back halfway up the Carlisle half, before finding Mendez-Laing. The number eleven touch a touch to go wide before cutting back inside as Lewis claimed the ball from him six yards out.
As Max Bird went off to a standing ovation and chants of “He’s one of our own!” with six minutes to play, he was visibly emotional. And he was far from the only one as the final few minutes ticked by. Rams fans were flocking towards, and even over, the advertising hoardings whilst the game was still ongoing, prompting the request from the authorities for fans just to stay off the pitch until full time, as opposed to the usual stay off the pitch at all times, and just over two of the three minutes of stoppage time to be played.
As much of the crowd spilled out onto the pitch upon the full time, so did an abundance of relief and pride, as Paul Warne himself described feeling, as well as pure elation. It was as if the valve holding all the difficulties of the last few years had been released. After all the time spent attempting to understand football governance and finance, the intricacies of EFL charges, player amortisation, interchangeable fixture lists, failed takeovers, and administration (or, let’s be honest, waiting for Kieran Maguire to make it make sense). This club had in many ways been a car crash in the years before saviour David Clowes came in, and not just metaphorically. But now, this was football in its purest form, about the connections between the owner, players, staff and fans.
After years of turmoil David Clowes has come in and rebuilt the club from the brink of extinction in less than two years. Paul Warne and his staff have achieved a fourth promotion from League One, which is what they were brought in to do. But they have done so whilst helping Clowes and co. to create a real feel-good culture around the club, which is night and day from that of the pre-administration era. From the better, closer relationships with the local media, to improved communication with fans, to Clowes and CEO Stephen Pearce celebrating with Ewes fans as Derby County Women won national silverware at FC United of Manchester’s Broadhurst park last weekend. There are many things happening now at Derby which would have been frankly unimaginable under the previous ownership.
When David Clowes came in, he pledged “integrity, transparency, and a straightforward way of doing business”. He has stuck to that promise, and in Paul Warne, he appointed a head coach who also embodies these principles. Warne has previously stressed the importance of signing good people first and foremost, who are also good at their jobs. The result is that the club is made up the types of people that fans can only be proud to have representing it.
It hit me as celebratory graphics and Championship branding appeared around the stadium and again before the players were given their medals and presented with a trophy by David Clowes: Derby County are now both back on a stable footing and heading back to the second tier.
Derby (3-4-1-2): Wildsmith (GK), Nelson, Bradley (Blackett-Taylor 90’), Cashin, Wilson (Hourihane 72’), Smith, Adams, Sibley (Elder 72’), Bird (Thompson 83’), Collins, Mendez-Laing (C) (Barkhuizen 83’).
Substitutes not used: Vickers (GK), Washington.
Carlisle (5-3-2): Lewis (GK), Back, Barclay, Lavelle (C), Mellish, Armer, McCalmont, Neal, McGeouch (Diamond 73’), Kelly (Gibson 69’), Armstrong.
Substitutes not Used: Breeze (GK), Harris, Emmanuel, Dudik.
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