Three Clubs Look to get Back to the Big Time

Jul 8, 2011
Jamie Clark

'The wally with the brolly' is back in English football with Nottingham Forest - Fakwes

Is this upcoming season the one where the East Midlands finally sees one or more of its sides return to the Premier League?

If you don’t count the aberration of Derby County’s record low points total in 2007-08, you have to go back to 2003-04 and Leicester City’s fall from grace for the last time a side from the East Midlands properly competed in the Premier League. That too was a one-season stay so you have look even further into the past, more than a decade in fact, to find teams from this region that were established in what many call the best league of world football.

Here in the present, the three biggest clubs in an area of the country starved of top flight action, with Nottingham Forest added to Leicester and Derby, are all looking to make their own promotion pushes to get back into the big time. Each has a different approach on tackling the gruelling forty-six game Championship season, but the one thing they have in common is a big name in the dugout.

Derby County

There’s been precious little to celebrate at Pride Park over the last few years. The humiliation of gaining a mere eleven points in that Premier League campaign was a spectre that took its time to lift. A poor home record continued in following seasons, with the Rams achieving no better than mid-table obscurity since.

In Nigel Clough, they have the son of perhaps the greatest managerial icon whose style lives on. Derby’s current boss is not his father though and whatever he goes on to do comparisons will do him no good. The name Clough is one synonymous with greatness and the second generation of that has his own ideas about how to achieve it.

County have been active in the transfer window so far, turning the loan spells of three players permanent from last season. Goalkeeper Frank Fielding is very highly-rated so capturing him from Blackburn was a coup. The strike force though is something that is somewhat less exciting. Clough can’t help himself, buying lower league players is something he has done consistently since taking charge at Pride Park, but it is yet to yield the success he proclaims it will.

None of the forward signings made so far are proven goalscorers at this level. Two need to form a partnership if they are to have any chance of promotion. In defence Jason Shackell partnering club captain Shaun Barker looks excellent on paper, a pair that has the experience to keep Derby in the hunt. Sadly the Rams have lost Robbie Savage to retirement, a player who cannot be replaced. The jury thus remains out on their Premier League hopes, but the tag of outsiders may suit them.

Leicester City

Former England manager Sven-Goran Eriksson is in charge of the Foxes and with the club’s wealthy owners giving him full backing after last season’s push for a playoff place faltered approaching the final hurdles, they’re going all out to get automatic promotion with substantial investment. This vindicates them being second favourites behind West Ham with the bookmakers to go up.

Leicester’s intent can no better be shown than by the signing of Reading captain Matt Mills for a fee thought to be more than £5 million. That is a massive amount of money in this division, but having sold one highly-rated centre back in Jack Hobbs, they’ve brought in what is an experienced and equally if not more talented player, with the same to be said for Mills’ prospective partner Sean St Ledger.

The midfield area was so strong last term that Sven doesn’t really need to add much to it, especially with the 4-3-3 system the Foxes have been using and the arrival of Neil Danns on a free. Captain Andy King was the club’s top scorer last term, one of those three in the middle of park, so improved striking options not so much out wide but down the middle are a necessity.

David Nugent, another player who cost nothing, will provide versatility in the final third, but Sven could do with luring Yakubu who spent the second half of the last campaign on loan from Everton or someone similar to be the centre forward that completes the puzzle. Kasper Schmeichel, a player who worked with Eriksson at Notts County, has been drafted in to solve the goalkeeping lapses which cost Leicester that top-six finish in 2010-11.

Nottingham Forest

Another playoff heartbreak last time was more than many Tricky Trees fans could endure. It spelled the end of Billy Davies’s tenure at the City Ground, his vast experience at second tier level couldn’t save him, and he was replaced with ex-England boss Steve McClaren. A controversial move to say the least, with the former Middlesbrough manager’s reputation damaged by failure to get to Euro 2008, the sceptics have already made their feelings known.

If we ignore the existence of ‘McClaren specials’ being offered by the boomakers, including a market for on when he'll be sacked, he is presiding over something of a transition at Forest. Senior players including Robert Earnshaw have left, putting the onus on the younger ones brought in by Billy Davies to perform.

The intentions of his successor are clear with the return of Andy Reid to the City Ground though. If McClaren can attract names of that calibre then the reds will remain in the mix. A proven goalscorer is again what is required, with Dexter Blackstock still recovering from a long-term injury. More essential is a left back and the centre half area could do with cover.

Nottingham Forest are one of a host of clubs that are joint third favourites for promotion, something that reflects their previous back-to-back top-six finishes and the fact that the core of the team is still there despite the thirty-somethings moving on. They’ve been out the Premier League for the longest time and who could begrudge a club getting back there that once ruled Europe?