Derby County nearly snatched an unlikely win against local rivals Nottingham Forest; trailing 1-0 nil going into the final minute they could have won it in stoppage time.
Stephanie Smith equalised in the 90th minute with a curling effort inside the area that both curled and dipped agonisingly out of the grasp of Aja Aguirre who was minutes away from keeping a clean sheet on her Forest debut.
The goal invigorated the Derby side who had to feed off scraps in regulation time. They had the momentum and deep inside injury time. Jodie Redgrave was left free of the attention of the red shirted defenders and hit a thunderous shot that thudded off the crossbar. If Aguirre did get a finger tip to that shot it didn’t lose any of its venom.
Aguirre who signed for Forest in the days before this game; on loan from Championship side Aston Villa was in good form today and pulled off some excellent saves. She did, however, have very little to do for most of the match.
Derby started the day in third but did not look like the team in form. Forest have had an inconstant season and a change in manager and a certain shuffling of players has put a new determination in their step. That determination showed today whether a local derby or not they were keen to win the midfield battle and under Sianna Bennett they did just that.
Forest was the better side in the first half, although, they did have an early scare as in the sixth minute Derby had the ball in the back of the Forest goal. It was ruled out offside and Forest may have thought they were in for a difficult afternoon.
They started to grow in the game and in the tenth minute they were in front. Helena Constantinou’s corner hung in the air over a cluster of bodies and although Sarah Morgan got her hands to the ball she could only watch as it slipped and found its way across the line. It was difficult to tell if the keeper was impeded but the referee was in no doubt.
Forest started to dominate and should have gone into the break two up as Katie Middleton the young Forest striker used her pace to run at the Derby defence and her cross struck towards the back post found it’s target Jordan Atkin. If anything, it was hit too well, and Atkin could not direct the ball the right side of the post.
An attendance of 1252 was at the Eastwood ground to see this game a record for a Forest home game. The only attendance bigger than today's was when the two sides met at Derby’s Ipro Stadium earlier in the season. On that occasion, Derby was winner 1-0.
Forest will take a lot of heart from this game as they look to build for next season. There is no reason why this fixture in the coming seasons can’t be a fixture to look forward to not just for the fans of the two clubs but for the natural as well.
