It all starts at the top really. Small club with over egoed owners who may or may not be right and proper people to own the club spending next to nothing (one notable exception to that rule) and hoping against hope that the season lasts beyond September. Crap ground that is in urgent need of modernisation or a complete rebuild.

Feel sorry for the team. They didn't ask to be put together by 3rd rate managers and 4th rate owners andd fell for the ruse based on history that has not been repeated in a long, long time. Admittedly Derby aren't what they were but we have been to the promised land on 2 separate occasions in the past 20 years although the 2nd was a short lived disaster. They have to play in a ramshackle stadium that is never full and hasn't been from way before they cut the DCFC allocation to make it seem less like an away game for them. We might have been stuck in the Championship for 10 years now but at least we have been in with at least half a shout or better of going up in half of those seasons.

The fans? Way more fickle than our lot. I remember the mass walkout by a good half of them at Pride Park when the 4th went in and the chants of "why the f*** are you still here?" when the 5th went in which saw half of those remaining shuffle forlornly out of the stadium. THAT season which saw us relegated also saw our fans unaminously nominated as best in the country by opposition fans. Forlorn folk addicted to living in the past.

Rivals? Only in terms of vying for the hearts and minds of potential supporters in those towns and villages lying roughly halfway between the 2 cities and, of course, for local bragging rights in pubs, clubs, schools and the workplace. Not a single hair on my balding head that entertains the slightest notion that the huggers of trees will be above us come May 2019.