Best By Country Mile – Crystal Palace Loan Star Impresses Former Derby County Man | OneFootball

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Former Derby County defender Shaun Barker believes that David Ozoh was one of the best players for the Rams against Millwall at the weekend.

The 19-year-old defensive midfielder came through the academy set-up of Crystal Palace and the Eagles sanctioned a loan deal for Ozoh to join Derby for the season last summer.

Ozoh started the season brilliantly for Derby but suffered a hamstring injury in September, which kept the Crystal Palace loanee out of action until January.

The energetic midfielder started the game against Millwall at the weekend but failed to help the Rams secure a victory as they went down to a 1-0 defeat at Pride Park.

However, Barker is of the view that Ozoh was one of the best players in the game for Derby and pointed out that he and Ebou Adams worked hard and drove the team forward.

He stressed however that Derby in the final third did not do enough to break Millwall down.

“I thought David Ozoh and Adams were the best players by a country mile for us”, Barker told Rams TV (1:55).

“I thought they constantly worked and tried to drive the team, but ultimately when you get to that final third, how many times did we ask a question of the two [Millwall] centre-halves? How many times did we ask [Lukas] Jensen to make a save in goal?”

Derby are in a deep relegation battle in the Championship and they are sitting 23rd in the league table, four points short of safety.

Crystal Palace will want Ozoh to get the benefits of being in a scrap for survival and will be looking to see he continues to feature regularly for Derby over the remaining months of the season.