Weekly Round-Up

The international break gave Derby fans time to ponder the ramifications of Mel Morris's takeover of the club with fervent wishes that the current MM will leave the club in a better state than did his initial-sharing Murdo Mackay. Whether Mel crushes all before him like Mick McManus in his prime or becomes an evil despot like Ming the Merciless we must wait to find out but it seems unlikely on the evidence so far that he will seek to emulate his counterpart in Nottingham and perfect an impression of a certain Michael Mouse.

Saturday saw Chris Martin celebrate Jeremy Corbyn's election as Labour leader by twice exercising his right to strike at Deepdale as Morris's anti-austerity measures at Derby finally appeared to be generating some green shoots of recovery, The Rams soaring up to mid-table and unusually suffering just a single serious injury to a midfielder. From Preston we travelled to Reading, and during the build-up to the game Derby fans enjoyed some typically highbrow and educational discussions about the various habits and attributes, some more endearing than others, of Musca domestica, a creature that thrives on decaying and excremental material but which sadly has a lifespan of only 2-3 weeks. Bookmakers have suspended betting on a housefly being named as the next manager of Notts Forest once Dougie Freedman's current lucky streak comes to an end.

Continuing the theme of matters faeculent, a Chinese woman had a diamond extracted from her large intestine with a colonoscope after attempting to steal it by swallowing it. In recent years Rams fans have seen occasional evidence that shopping at the bottom end of the market may result in some unexpected jewels although more commonly attempts to polish the items in question have not resulted in anything that one would like to see adorning The Queen’s tiara, unless one is Jeremy Corbyn that is. Derby’s current policy of “if you spend more it is bound to be better" has not seen universal approval with Tom Ince and Darren Bent singled out in particular for "not looking interested enough", an analysis to rank with Big Fat Ron's infamous critique of Champions League, Euro and World Cup winning Marcel Desailly, a player who might have achieved something in the game had he not been so dreadfully lazy. It appears to be the case that signings, like life, are a bit like a box of chocolates: you never quite know what you are going to get, and some fans evidently prefer their chocolate to be of the milk rather than dark variety.

There would surely have been no accusations of any Derby player lacking fire in the belly had they partaken of one of the pies on offer in the concourse area at Reading, where the lava-like temperatures of the meat-flavoured filling discomfited at least one fan, for whom the obvious remedy of waiting until the pie had cooled down a bit before eating it was unfortunately too taxing. Perhaps this was the reason for another blistering attack on Tom Ince, whose dash through the Reading defence to strike the winner was as ever tarnished by the flatness of his facial expression. Once fans have Made Their Mind Up about a player it seems that nothing can shift that opinion: Richard Keogh's superb start to the season appears to have gone completely unnoticed by those who queued up to criticise him during the previous campaign. Perhaps humble pie sticks in the craw just as painfully as a hot steak and kidney from Reading.