'Even more' - Derby County boss believes his side could have racked up more goals in 4-0 Portsmouth win
Portsmouth were beaten 4-0 by Derby County at Pride Park on Friday
Derby County boss Paul Warne felt his Rams side could have caused more pain for Portsmouth on Friday night at Pride Park as he believes the Rams created enough chances to score more goals in their 4-0 victory.
Kane Wilson, Eiran Cashin and Ebou Adams all netted for the hosts on a forgettable night for Pompey, with a Marlon Pack own goal midway through the second half wrapping up all three points for the home side. Warne felt Pompey caused some trouble for his side early on as he was pleased with how his side defended.
John Mousinho’s men did have 49 per cent possession but failed to cause any real problems for Derby, with just three shots - none of which were on target. Pompey are level on points with Cardiff City in 21st and Plymouth Argyle in 23rd, with all sides having played the same number of games at the time of publication. They are also one point behind Oxford United.
Reflecting on Derby’s win, Warne said: “It was really pleasing. I think we’ve been better in other home games, but the difference tonight was that we were clinical. If we had taken chances in previous matches, we'd be a lot more handsome. We’ve been pleased with a lot of performances and in fairness I thought we didn't have as much control as the scoreline suggested in the first half. They did have a bit of control, they went out wide, put early crosses in - but we defended most of them well. Generally, I thought we had a real personality to our play, so I was proud of them and the scoreline's nice. In fairness, so is the clean sheet! It could have been more, we created enough chances to be even more handsome and then the game took a different quality. After that, you saw a lot of personality from our players.
“What pleased me the most was the bravery to get on the ball. I thought we played well in the pockets. Most of all, the fact is this team is well coached to play different systems. We played 5-4-1 at Leeds, 3-5-2 at Burnley and we played two different systems tonight. The coaches got the messages across really well, but the lads are good students of the game. It isn't easy to know three different roles, but we can flick through systems quite easily and adapt well.
“If you said we'd have got four points from the next two matches against Burnley and Portsmouth after the Leeds game - I’d have taken that. In this league, averaging two points per game is promotion form, but one point or less is relegation form and that is how close the margins are in this league. I'd have taken it and I'm really proud of the lads’ performances in all three matches, if you take away the scoreline. There's been some amazing performances. We changed the full-backs tonight to keep it fresh and we changed it a bit in midfield - even as Thommo has been excellent. We’re always trying to shuffle it to keep it fresh all the time and in the end we saw a performance to be happy with.”