Derby County: The incredible world of the Rams

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Jane Goddard takes a look at a new book by YesterdayToday correspondent Peter Seddon which reveals some little-known facts about the club and charts the joy and despair of being a Rams fan.

THERE have been many books written about Derby County Football Club over the years but never one quite like The Little Book of Derby County, the latest title from lifelong Rams fan Peter Seddon.

Trying to describe this latest offering is not easy, but one reviewer has already said “it’s just impossible to put down, crammed full of thousands of snippets of trivia all laid out in short sections which make it one of those ‘dip in’ books that is so easy to read”.

As well as being fascinating, it’s also very humorous as Peter recalls many anecdotes from the Rams’ illustrious history.

In his introduction, Peter says his inspiration for the book was the often-heard phrase “it could only happen at Derby County”. He decided to put together some material which actually proved it!

And it certainly succeeds in that.

Did you know about the “severed head” discovered at the Baseball Ground one dark night in 1972?

Or that Derby County are the only club to “lose” both their penalty spots?

When was Steve Bloomer’s ghost spotted at Pride Park?

Which player appears in census returns as a female? Which full-back died in a lunatic asylum?

And why was Derby’s ace winger Alan Hinton so humiliatingly dropped after the worst televised miss of all time?

Those are just six of more than 1,000 weird and wonderful tales to be enjoyed in this unique collection – not a history book or statistics, just a great entertaining read that all Rams fans will savour.

As Peter suggests in the book, Derby County are a club that things happened to right from the start.

Soon after their birth in 1884, they became the only football club in the world formed from a cricket club to play at both a racecourse and then a baseball ground which also held athletics, boxing and wrestling events.

They lost their first-ever game 6-0 (on the 13th of the month), were thrashed 7-0 at home in their very first FA Cup tie, but then won 6-3 away in their first-ever League game.

No wonder Derby County fans grew to accept whatever life threw at them.

And that included more financial scandals than even one-time chairman Robert Maxwell could have lived with.

The opening chapter is titled They Said It.

As the name suggests, it comprises hundreds of Rams-related quotes, from Brian Clough to Lionel Pickering, Charlie George to Jeremy Keith and everyone in between.

Included in this humorous chapter is the late, great Peter Taylor whose “Top six by Christmas” and “My missus could have scored that” have become catchphrases regularly called on by stoical Derby fans even today.

Naturally there is a place for the legendary Radio Derby commentator Graham Richards, who once described striker Paulo Wanchope as “a two legged tripod” and said of midfielder Lee Carsley: “If he was a painter he’d put the paint in the lawnmower – he’d be a good player on the moon though.”

And there are many more where that one came from!

Some of the sections are more poignant. There is a run-down of the Derby players who served their country in both world wars, some of whom met very tragic ends, or others who perished in unexpected circumstances, like surviving the battlefields of the First World War only to die of food-poisoning.

And then there is Philip Bloomer, who might have matched his brother Steve for greatness, but died, aged only 21, after just one game for the Rams.

Above all though, The Little Book of Derby County is a fun book which celebrates the joy, triumph and occasional despair of following a great club.

The Little Book of Derby County, published by Breedon Books, is available from the Pride Park shop, all local bookshops or via the internet, priced £9.99 (ISBN 1 85983 521X).

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