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Championship: Steve McClaren hails Derby's win at Watford

Derby County manager Steve McClaren during the Sky Bet Championship, Play-off Semi Final
Image: Steve McClaren: Big three points for Derby

Steve McClaren admitted he thought Derby County had "lost our moment" to beat Watford after Craig Bryson's superb late strike earned the table-topping Rams a 2-1 victory at Vicarage Road.

Derby dominated the first half and deservedly led at the interval through another fine strike, scored by Jordan Ibe. But the Hornets improved significantly after the break and after Gianni Munari had equalised, looked well placed to go on and beat the league leaders.

McClaren said: "I thought we'd lost our moment. We needed a second goal and we should have had that. We were losing it, having dominated the game for an hour.

"We played great possession football, some great chances, a great goal and were in the driving seat and in control. But you can't go through 90 minutes at a place like Watford with the quality they've got and not expect to come under some pressure.

"We knew it was coming and for 20 minutes we had our backs against the wall and this team showed it's got a bit of everything. Jack Butland made some great saves, great defending, blocks, headers to make sure that we stayed in the game.

"And the value of a squad in the end, [Bryson] coming off the bench, making an impact and getting the winner, so it's a big, big three points; a statement we wanted to make after the international break."

This was Watford's third straight defeat and head coach Slavisa Jokanovic acknowledged the chalk-and-cheese nature of his side's display in the two halves.

"We played the first 45 minutes without energy," he said. "We didn't play a good game and we didn't press them really. With the goal, we were a little bit scared. We weren't being brave and played many passes at the back slowly. We had many problems in the first 45 minutes.

"It's true in the first half Derby were more dangerous but my team made some important chances in the first 45 minutes. In the second 45 minutes the situation is a complete change and it's probably the best 45 minutes in the last month and a half I have been here.

"We played very well, we made many chances and then they scored the goal and win the game. They scored twice and they scored because they are very talented players and football, sometimes it's fair, sometimes it's not fair but this is football."

Jokanovic praised the performance of goalkeeper Jonathan Bond, who made three fine saves in the first half, but added: "It is a clear situation, we don't have a good performance.

"What I want to think is we'll follow this [game] with something similar with what we did in the second half. We didn't make any tactical changes, we changed one player for another [Matej Vydra for Odion Ighalo], but we were more aggressive, had more energy, more brave, we decided to have the control of the match."

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