While his spell at Derby County came to an end before the period of chaos from 2020 onwards, one former Rams coach has had a lot to say about Mel Morris and the previous regime at Pride Park, and it’s all positive.
The last few years have been tumultuous, to say the least, for Derby County. The club hit the highs of a Championship play-off final in 2019, but defeat there led to a sequence of events that would see the Rams slip into administration and get relegated to League One.
From Frank Lampard, to Wayne Rooney, and now Paul Warne, a number of Derby County managers have come and gone in the last four years, but thankfully, with new owners and more stable foundations, the club has managed to get back to the Championship.
Still, all the talk of Mel Morris and Stephen Pearce’s disastrous tenure passed one manager by, and he insists he had a pleasant experience while in charge of the Rams.
Gary Rowett had no issues with Mel Morris
Gary Rowett took charge of Derby in March 2017, and stayed at Pride Park through to the end of the following season before joining Stoke City.
The former Derby player managed to guide the club to the play-offs in his first full season in charge, but fell at the first hurdle to Fulham.
At that time, Derby County owner Mel Morris and executive Stephen Pearce had begun to earn quite the reputation as erratic and irresponsible, but Rowett saw nothing of the sort during his 14 months at the club.
He told the Business of Sport podcast: “At Derby, I had a brilliant relationship with Mel Morris and Stephen Pearce. I always treat people the way I find them. I think people in football are very quick to label people, players, owners.
“I went into Derby thinking about all these stories that the owner’s crazy, he’s doing all these different things in the dressing room, and I found none of that. Maybe that’s just the relationship I had, and you have to work on building that, but I’ve been very lucky.”
- READ MORE: Derby County fans urge Paul Warne to start making one major selection call, their stance is clear
Things are different at Derby County under David Clowes
After the previous owners spent money with abandon in the pursuit of a promotion that never came, financial difficulties followed and the club entered administration before being relegated to the third tier of English football.
Many would point to the 2015/16 season, where Derby spent over £28m on players in an attempt to become the best team in the Championship, as the moment things really started to fall apart at the club.
Indeed, the decision to deviate from the standard amortised payment structure most football clubs follow was regarded as a crucial complication to the whole situation, and is what largely led to the Football League punishing Derby so severely.
Morris and Pearce eventually left the club, with new owner, David Clowes, taking over in July 2022. Things have gone from strength to strength since then, with Clowes overseeing a period stabilisation and calm, and indeed, success.
| Season | Players signed | Expenditure |
|---|---|---|
| 2015/16 | 12 | £28.31m |
| 2018/19 | 13 | £11.62m |
| 2019/20 | 7 | £6.82m |
| 2024/25 | 12 | £3.02m |
The Rams gained promotion back to the Championship after finishing second in League One last year, and are now sitting in 12th place in the second tier with one third of the season gone.
One only has to look at the business conducted by the club over the summer to see that Derby County are taking a different approach to chasing success now. Derby spent just over £3m prior to their return to the Championship, putting them 18th in the league’s spending charts.
Clearly, there will be no panic buying or mass spending to try and compete with the big guns for short-term gain. Instead, it appears Clowes and his board are taking a more measured and shrewd approach, and ensuring solid foundations are in place at the club for the foreseeable future.