First East Midlands derby for 12 years 'pivotal' for both

The cliché goes that a week is a long time in football.

With that in mind, Derby County and Leicester City are proof that a decade is an eternity in the game.

It has been almost 12 years since these two sides last met in the league.

In that time, Leicester City have twice secured promotion from the Championship as title winners, won a previously unfathomable Premier League, reached the knockout stage of the Champions League and lifted the FA Cup for the first time in their history.

They've also added the Charity Shield to their trophy cabinet and got to the semi-final of the Europa Conference League for good measure.

As for Derby, they twice missed out on promotion to the Premier League after losing Championship play-off finals at Wembley in 2014 and again in 2019 , spent 282 days in administration, were relegated to League One where they spent two seasons and won promotion back to the second tier.

Relegation from the Premier League last season landed Leicester back in the Championship for the second time in three years, while Derby narrowly avoided relegation themselves to remain in the league.

And now, despite the wildly different fortunes over the past decade, it is the Rams who go into this East Midlands derby game at Pride Park (12:30 GMT) in a better position - 11th in the table and five places and two points above the Foxes.

With six wins in eight games, John Eustace's Derby side have emerged as a potential promotion contender, while five defeat in eight games has Foxes boss Marti Cifuentes under huge pressure to keep hold of his job.

And with the threat of a points deduction still hanging over the club over alleged spending rule breaches, the prospect of relegation is not incomprehensible for Leicester – although midfielder Jordan James insisted you would be "out of your mind" to think the club would drop into League One.

Martyn Waghorn, a striker that had five years with Leicester before going on to have two spells with Derby, says the first meeting of these regional rivals for more than a decade comes as a "statement game".

"It's a big game for two different reasons, for both clubs and both managers," the now retired forward told BBC Sport.

"I don't want to overemphasise anything and say it is a massive game, but it will be crucial and pivotal in terms of where they are both going."

Waghorn topped the scoring charts for both his former clubs in the East Midlands.

The 12 goals that made him Leicester's highest scorer in the Championship in 2009-10 came when the Foxes had only just returned to the division from League One.

He left Leicester for Wigan Athletic in January 2014, just months before they won promotion to the top-flight with a team that formed the nucleus of the one that would lift the Premier League title just two years later – with striker Jamie Vardy up front, captain Wes Morgan anchoring the defence and Danny Drinkwater in midfield.

After spells with Wigan, Ipswich Town and in Scotland with Rangers, Waghorn signed for Derby for the first time.

In that first season, the Rams fell one win short of promotion to the Premier League, but by the time he left in 2021 they were battling to stay in the division.

Relegation was avoided under then boss Wayne Rooney in 2020-21 with Waghorn in the team, but administration and the points penalty that came with it condemned the Rams to the drop a season later.

Waghorn then re-signed for the club to help them out of League One in the 2023-24 season.

Even in retirement he was called on by Derby, with Eustace asking the striker to train last season as they battled to keep hold of their Championship status.

"In terms of the journey that Derby have been on in the past 10 years, they are coming full circle to where they needed to be going and are again challenging and in a good position at the minute," Waghorn added.

The same, however, cannot be said for Leicester.

"It's the flip side for them," said Waghorn.

"Of course they went up [in 2014], stayed up there, won the Premier League title, played Champions League, Europa League and were competing at the highest level in that time frame, but they are now back in the Championship.

"In 10 years there is always going to be highs and lows for clubs, and these two have been dealt their fair share of blows.

"But hopefully they are both on the rise again and can be competing in the top level very soon. They both deserve to be."

Waghorn said he would "plant a foot in both camps" with his prediction of a 2-2 draw on Saturday, insists both sides have the "qualities" to be among the sides "in the mix" for promotion this season.

"At this time of year, if you can put two or three results together in one week you can from mid-table to being right in the mix of the play-off places," he said.

"One good week, one good result can turn things right around. Saturday will be a big game."