‘We’re Very Eager’ – Cifuentes On Derby Bout

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‘We’re Very Eager’ – Cifuentes On Derby Bout

Martí Cifuentes spoke about the need to continue the work to improve several aspects of our game in the lead up to Saturday’s encounter with Derby County.

2025-12-05T08:30+00:00

by Sam Jones

Published

05 Dec, 2025

‘We’re Very Eager’ – Cifuentes On Derby Bout

Martí Cifuentes spoke about the need to continue the work to improve several aspects of our game in the lead up to Saturday’s encounter with Derby County.

Sam Jones

2025-12-05T08:30+00:00

‘We’re Very Eager’ – Cifuentes On Derby Bout

Martí Cifuentes spoke about the need to continue the work to improve several aspects of our game in the lead up to Saturday’s encounter with Derby County.

Sam Jones

2025-12-05T08:30+00:00

‘We’re Very Eager’ – Cifuentes On Derby Bout

Martí Cifuentes spoke about the need to continue the work to improve several aspects of our game in the lead up to Saturday’s encounter with Derby County.

Sam Jones

2025-12-05T08:30+00:00

‘We’re Very Eager’ – Cifuentes On Derby Bout

Martí Cifuentes spoke about the need to continue the work to improve several aspects of our game in the lead up to Saturday’s encounter with Derby County.

Sam Jones

2025-12-05T08:30+00:00

We head to Pride Park this weekend aiming to end a run of two consecutive Sky Bet Championship defeats and, in Thursday’s pre-match press conference at LCFC Training Ground, Cifuentes outlined plans for that East Midlands derby.

‘We must look at ourselves’

Speaking to the media this week.

Reflecting on defeats to Southampton and Sheffield United, which leave us 16th in the standings, conceding three first-half goals in each gave us too much to do. And although the Spaniard wants to take the positive of how his side responded last time out, encouraged by the fight shown, our mentality in certain moments of the game needs to be worked on.

“When we look back at, especially the last couple of games, they have been disappointing for us and for our fans,” City’s Manager told reporters in Seagrave. “We’re angry with how it has been developing and that’s why we are very eager.

“The positive of it is that I saw a reaction in the second half of the last game. Again, it’s not the first one. We still need to understand that it doesn’t matter how the table looks, we must look at ourselves to get the results.

“The last two first halves have been far from our standards and what we want to build here. It’s been disappointing. That’s what we shared with the players. I think all of us are aligned on this.

“That’s why I said that it’s important, despite how negative and bad it felt, that we had the reaction in the second half (against Sheff Utd). It was not enough, and we need to look at why we were in this situation, but we need to be stronger when things don’t go our way.

“There will be moments in the game – the last game is a clear example – when the opponent will feel confident and have some moments. We need to deal with that and manage to get closer to be together in these moments.

“And then when we have momentum as we did against Norwich and the second half against Sheffield United, try to capitalise as much as we can. When you concede three goals in such a short space of time, it becomes very difficult.”

‘It’s the next opportunity’

John Eustace has overseen a promising start to the season for Derby.

Winning six of the last eight league matches, the Rams’ recent record under John Eustace has put Saturday’s hosts in early play-off contention, though form often goes out of the window in derby games, with Cifuentes also referencing the rivalry surrounding the fixture, ahead of his first experience of being in the dugout for it.

The 43-year-old continued: “I’ve been trying to learn about it since I came here and there are former players and people in the Club who have been here for a long time and help me to understand the background and the history of these matches. It’s the same as Coventry and Forest - different kind of rivalries.

“It’s the next game and the next opportunity against a team who are doing well. They’ve won many of the last games. They are definitely in a good dynamic, though they lost the last game against Boro. It’s a team with a clear style.

“There is no doubt that we need to understand what kind of game we are going to play. They are direct in their play, strong on set plays, although they have been conceding some set piece goals lately. The kind of game I can imagine, it’s quite clear.

“It’s about the next game and we know that there is an opportunity because of how the table is and the nature of the Championship, which is so long. But at the same time, you cannot rely on that - we need to change and improve and be better from now.”

‘Understand the game’

Out on the training pitch.

Without a clean sheet in 12 matches, refining the defensive side of the game is a focus of the coming weeks, and Cifuentes assured no one will get carried away should form improve.

“It’s not easy, you need to deal with the good and bad moments,” he added. "I’m someone who tries to be quite balanced. When there are good times, I think it’s important to keep feet on the ground.

“When there are tough moments, you need to make sure you keep the positive energy because I understand a club like this is in a situation that we knew would perhaps take some time [to rectify]. That’s where we are. We need to now navigate through this and try to improve the things that we can improve.

“I always try to understand the game, not only the defensive part or the attacking part, but as a whole. The better we attack, the better we’re going to defend. We’re aware that we’re conceding more than we would like to.

“Having said that, when you look at our record against other teams, it is not that we are conceding an incredible amount of goals, but definitely in the last games, when you concede six goals, and a big amount of goals on set plays as well, there is no doubt that it’s one of the areas we want to improve.

“It doesn’t matter if you win five games in a row, there’s always going to be a way to improve. In football, the perfect game doesn’t exist.”

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