Derby faced two tough away games, at Doncaster and Millwall, as they aimed to continue their excellent recent form.

The club’s first task was to shrug off media speculation linking Spanish star Alberto Bueno with a move to a Premier League club. It was either story-dredging or lazy journalism from the tabloids, because Bueno is a Derby player for the remainder of 2010-11, there is no recall clause in his loan contract.

Bueno is certainly an exciting player to watch; he’s intelligent and skilful, and enjoying life in Derby. With Commons in sparkling scoring form alongside Cywka’s running and foraging, defences don’t know which way to turn - except opposing goalies, who must regularly turn round and stoop to pick the ball out of their net.

The Tuesday trip to the Keepmoat Stadium Doncaster looked tricky, but Derby sustained their exciting recent form with one of their best performances of the season.

It was all Derby as they played Doncaster off the park in the first half. That’s no mean feat, given Donny’s own football pedigree and their very good record against Derby. Luke Moore steered in Derby’s first goal to put his side into early control and Commons clipped home the second soon after the break.

Derby allowed Shiels to grab two quick goals for Rovers soon after in a wobbly spell as the home side recovered - but Bueno then put Commons through to rap in his 7th goal of the campaign and secure a very good win.

Derby showed resilience late in the game, where in earlier days this season, they might have folded and given the match away. The Rams continued to battle, fought to play their football for Commons to snatch the points back with a decisive strike.

Over 1,700 away fans had been rewarded for their midweek trip with a great Derby performance and some classy strikes as Derby out-footballed a Donny team renowned for their good play. The victory lifted Derby to 7th in the league table.

There was more good news for Derby from Moor Farm, where Miles Addison was now joining in some of the first team training, recovering from his foot injury ahead of expectations and looking to have a chance of rejoining the squad early in 2011.

The reserves drew 3-3 in a League Cup group match with Rotherham United, teenage striker Callum Ball netting twice; the young Irish striker then hit a hat-trick for Derby’s Under-18s as they beat Sheffield Wednesday 4-1. Ball has a dozen goals to his credit so far this season and looks to be a good young prospect.

Derby County could host the major young football festival in a few years’ time too, as Pride Park Stadium was selected among several Midlands’ clubs in the bid to stage the European Under-21 Championships tournament in 2013.

A related affair on the national horizon is that finally, obstacles to planning permission approvals for the Burton football centre have been overcome. The England complex has been an FA project for a dozen years now; perhaps it will actually be built soon. FA budget delays and local objections have held up progress.

It’s no wonder that this country has found the development of top class youth players so difficult. Alongside the reliance of top clubs on imported players with a low quotient of home-grown players in first-team squads, deferment of the Burton project have been symptomatic of the unstable and unproductive regime at the head of the English game.

Wayne Rooney and Fergie fed the week’s football media feeding-frenzy, with their seemingly contrived public divorce and reconciliation. The upshot was an obscene £1m per month, five-year contract for the out-of-form striker - and Sir Alex’s expectation of a large transfer budget so as to recruit players of sufficient quality for the Old Trafford club to meet with the approval of Rooney and his advisors.

Football paid its respects this week to Malcolm “Big Mal” Allison, the colourful and progressive coach who passed away recently. His teams showed certain flair, as memorable as his flashy fedora headwear.

Seeing those larger-than-life images with his stylish appearance and big cigar made me smile in reflection of the great character he was, alongside such as Clough, Shankly and Busby - great men who moved the game on to greater heights.

After the great see-saw win away at Doncaster in midweek, we looked to see if Derby could sustain their recent impetus on Saturday. Millwall stood in the way of Derby’s progress up the table; the Rams eliminated the Lions from the FA Cup last season. A penalty shoot-out win for Derby came after the teams were locked 1-1 at full time and then the Lions comfortably in the League at the end of last season.

The New Den is always a tough venue to visit and so it proved on Saturday, as Derby’s 6-match unbeaten run came to an end in a disappointing 2-0 defeat. Millwall started brightly and kept the initiative for most of the match, pressing Derby whilst denying the Rams space to nullify the creative talents of Commons and Bueno.

Conceding goals either side of the half-time break is usually fateful - and Derby had no answer to Millwall’s hard-nosed and gritty display. The Lions seized and kept control of the game as they were dangerous in attack and miserly in defence.

Derby’s best efforts were a Moxey piledriver saved by Lion’s keeper Forde, and a 2nd half Barker header that the centre half really should have put away.

Almost 1,100 travelling fans in the 12,000 crowd at the New Den saw Derby fall back down to 12th in the Championship table, though fans and club will be generally happy with the progress over the last month or so.

Derby had an almost equal share of possession and won 9 corners - 1 more than Millwall - but failed to make it count. Still plenty of room for improvement for the Rams if they have pretensions to challenge at the right end of the table at last.

Derby manager Nigel Clough agreed that his team were a little short on energy after the two excellent recent wins over Preston and Doncaster; he added that Derby made errors and conceded goals at critical times.

Nevertheless, He expects his side to kick on and start another unbeaten run, starting against Watford next Saturday.

At the moment, Clough is a dweller on the threshold; moving closer to productive football but still falling short sometimes to battle-hardened opponents. His 2010-11 team shows great promise, as it is now not a shock to witness them playing great football and burying teams in a flurry of goals with skilful, exhibition football.

It is also unsurprising to see them out-fought and out-muscled, nullified by more physically capable teams. The likes of Sheffield United and Millwall represent this obstacle to progress, the Rams being turned over by determined, uncompromising sides that recognise how to stop Derby’s footballers getting a foothold in the game.

More strength and quality will be needed to turn Clough’s hopefuls into the sort of attractive but relentless winning machines that a certain Brian Clough fashioned.

After-match reaction had Rams fans urging the club to invest in a proven striker, someone to take the chances that our creative midfielders are capable of providing. January will tell us how the purse-strings are tied (or slackened). Perhaps an attractive fee for Luke Varney, on loan to Premier League Blackpool, is the key to the situation?

Millwall had forced Derby to revert to their rather ineffective September form with their powerful display; it was a meek end to a successful run that had taken the Rams from the bottom three to the fringe of the leading group in the Npower Championship.

A home win over Watford next Saturday would be a good tonic.

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RamsWeek 43 in 2009 spoke of ‘good times, bad times’ with a poor week for Derby County on the pitch but celebration of the best times of all recognised, with the launch of the club’s Clough & Taylor statue project.

A feeble midweek showing from Derby in the 2-0 defeat at Middlesbrough wasn’t enough to appease the Riverside chairman Steve Gibson, who dispensed with Boro manager Gareth Southgate anyway.

A year on, Boro are of course in a far worse League position and have got rid of Southgate’s successor!

The Saturday match was the infamous televised 2-4 QPR home defeat, Derby leading 2-0 then capitulating - which led fans to hurl their free T-shirts onto the pitch in disgust.

Free gestures and ceaseless smiling from vacuous reassurances about progress tomorrow can’t replace a successful team - and fans’ frustration at the depleted, inconsistent squad spilled out that afternoon.

RamsWeek said we were in for a relegation battle in 2009-10 after a debacle of a week; we weren’t wrong.

Strikers John Stead and Jamie Mackie were linked with future moves to Derby (if only....) and Nigel Clough recruited midfielder Bryan Hughes on loan. Out of favour at Hull City and as it happened, sadly out of form, he was gone and forgotten within a few weeks from Pride Park Stadium. Loans are a stop-gap, then as now.

Robbie Savage decided to blast the local media, criticising Radio Derby for criticising the crappy Derby County performances.

It was a tiresome and blinkered volley from the mad-haired Welshman - and sadly one that was repeated shortly afterwards after the radio station dared to relay their impression of the performances of the team and the poor on-field discipline of the players.

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