Derby County have gone to the foot of the EFL Championship after the two-time champions of England went into administration on Wednesday.
Owner Mel Morris has failed in a number of attempts to sell the club over the past two years and recently revealed the club is in debt and losing more than £1 million a month currently, after pumping more than £200 million of his personal money into the club.
As a result the Rams have been docked 12 points, putting them on -2 after eight games, nine points adrift of safety.
To make matters worse, the club were already under a transfer embargo, limiting the number of players the club can have in their first team squad. Manager Wayne Rooney has been forced to use a number of teenage and inexperienced players in the opening two months of the 2021-22 campaign.
With this and Derby’s financial situation, the East Midlands club entered the season as odds on favourites to be relegated to the third tier for only the second time in their history. It’s extremely rare that a Championship club start the season as odds on favourites. The best price you can now find is a mere 1/7.
Players and staff will have the opportunity to leave the club if they go 28 days without being paid at any point. Derby are unable to sell players until January when the winter transfer window opens.
With their perilous position and potential for more points to be deducted, purchasing the club cannot be an attractive offer for many buyers.
Things working in the club’s favour are their history of having won the top flight on two separate occasions in the 1970s, having a loyal support that is one of the loudest in the country and a 33,000 stadium that often attracts one of the second tier’s highest average attendances in the country.
