Derby County ended their losing streak of four consecutive league games with a 1-1 draw at Fratton Park. But dear oh dear, it was so close to being so much better than that as Portsmouth didn't score their equaliser until the eighty-ninth minute of the game.
Manager Nigel Clough went 4-4-2 and made two changes from the team that narrowly lost to Ipswich Town in midweek, both changes up front where Chris Porter and Alberto Bueno were replaced by Steven Davies and Tomasz Cywka.
The manager commented on both replacements after the game but in different ways. Steven Davies received praise for his goal and work rate over 72 minutes, although Clough admitted he looked a bit rusty at times.
Cywka, on the other hand, was the focal point for Clough's frustration at seeing three points become one so late in the game.
Talking to BBC Radio Derby after the game, Cywka was blamed by the manager for giving the ball away for the equaliser and dismissed suggestions from interviewer Colin Gibson that Cywka may have been fouled. I've heard Clough blame players publicly before but I've never heard him label players as "not very bright" before - a comment that surely won't do Cywka's confidence or his motivation any good.
Steven Davies gave the Rams the lead in the thirty-fourth minute with a well executed acrobatic volley from a lovely Cywka cross - an assist that Clough didn't acknowledge when calling the young Polish player "not very bright". Giving the ball away for the equaliser, yes; touching the ball late on in an offside position to concede a free-kick instead of a throw-in, yes; making the wrong decisions on the football pitch, yes; but acknowledging an assist for Derby County's goal, sadly not.
Portsmouth's equaliser was an equally well-taken goal in the eighty-ninth minute. Shaun Barker rose above Kanu just outside the penalty area but his downward headed clearance went maybe two, three yards to David Nugent who trapped the ball before striking a half-volley past Stephen Bywater.
Nugent had earlier wasted a couple of other chances, scuffing a shot which Bywater palmed away on twenty minutes and then hooking a shot over the bar from six yards after the break. Over ninety minutes though Bywater hardly had a shot to save.
At the other end Ben Davies's first-half free-kick was saved by Pompey goalkeeper Jamie Ashdown and Ben Davies also hit a volley narrowly wide two minutes into the second-half.
As the game wore on, Pompey piled on the pressure and the Rams were forced to defend for their lives. John Brayford did well to head over his own bar on eighty-five minutes with Nugent waiting behind him to score. It looked as if Derby County were going to hold out for a much needed victory but, unfortunately, it wasn't to be.
There were other telling comments in Clough's post-match interview with BBC Radio Derby too. The manager admitted that Steve Davies aside, they weren't too happy with the other strikers the Rams have at the moment and were looking to bring in one, possibly two strikers on loan - neither of them being Leicester City's Martyn Waghorn. That's in addition to Liverpool's injured central defender Daniel Ayala and another defender the Rams are looking to bring in on loan too. Clough also admitted that the team was lacking experience in all areas of the pitch.
Rams fans have been saying this for some time now. Shame the management team have only just realised it or, if they realised it earlier, were unable to do anything to address it during the January transfer window.
At least the draw at Fratton Park keeps Portsmouth three points and three places below us in the npower Championship. Seventeen games to go and the Rams need fifteen points to reach the fifty point mark that is usually enough to ensure survival in this division.
So another campaign will end with Derby County scrapping for points to avoid relegation. How different things looked back in October and November?...