John Smith column: ​​Drab performance would not have looked out of place in League One

The only reason I wanted the referee not to blow the final whistle as I shivered away in the Tom Finney Stand was because we had failed to secure what I felt was a much-needed confidence-boosting three points.

However, if we had kept on playing until the cows came home there probably would have been no further goals from either side.

With over a third of the season having now been chalked off this season’s fixture calendar, a glance at the table makes very uncomfortable viewing.

Our ship is definitely a long way from the play-off shores and the more games we play makes me feel that we might soon have to sound the foghorn as alarmingly we appear to be sailing towards the deeper choppy waters of the bottom three at an increasingly faster speed of knots

For me one of the most upsetting aspects of this game was that Derby's goal came with their only attempt on target throughout the whole of the 90 minutes.

Like the poorly defended goals we conceded in the sorry defeat at bottom of the table Portsmouth last time out, their goal came from a set piece when our lackadaisical pedestrian defence switched off at a vital time.

It left our old nemesis Jerry Yates unmarked and gave him the chance to revel in the role of pantomime villain as he gleefully headed in an equalising goal.

Minutes earlier we had taken the lead with a fantastic header from Sam Greenwood but again we failed to capitalise on it.

If I thought the first half was poor, the second was even worse.

The only time we made the Derby keeper earn his corn being when he was forced to tip away a Greenwood shot from outside the penalty area.

Had that gone in, Greenwood might well have nicked the man-of-the-match award from Kane Kesler-Hayden.

Apart from the exception of Ali McCann, the two loanees, as seems to have been the case in recent seasons, have looked to be our best players again this time around .

In the second half, record signing Milutin Osmajic was brought on but was totally ineffective and posed no threat whatsoever to the Derby defence who seemed content to play out the draw.

Another big money signing Jeppe Okkels again remained on the bench and I cannot understand the wisdom of paying £1.8 million for an untried winger at this level, especially when the reason given for not signing last year’s impressive loanee Liam Millar was because he wanted to play on the wing and not at wing back.

Our recruitment strategy needs to be far smarter in January if we are to remain a Championship side for many more seasons because on evidence of Saturday's performances both of these sides would not look out of place in League One.