What does Derby County's 0-0 draw at Wycombe mean for League One promotion chances?

Derby County have thrown away their advantage over Bolton Wanderers after they drew 0-0 to Wycombe Wanderers last night.

Paul Warne’s side failed to record a single shot on target in what was a poor game from the Rams.

Derby’s attackers couldn’t manage to create many significant chances, and when they did, they didn’t make the most of them.

Most notably was Corey Blackett-Taylor’s miss of what was virtually an open goal for the former Charlton man after Conor Washington played a ball across the box to him.

The Rams also looked to be without star man Nathaniel Mendez-Laing who failed to have much of an impact on the game.

So what does the 0-0 draw mean for the promotion race?

Well it means that going into the weekend, Derby remain in second, but are just two points ahead of their nearest rivals Bolton Wanderers.

The Trotters have a game in hand on Derby and so if they win their remaining four matches, they will finish second and the Rams will have to settle for the playoffs.

Yesterday’s result takes the promotion fate out of Derby’s hands which could have a massive psycological effect on Paul Warne’s players are they are now virtually part of the chasing pack.

Furthermore, as there is now a seven point gap to Portsmouth at the top of the table, Pompey will clinch the League One title with a win at the weekend.

The silver lining for Derby is that Portsmouth and Bolton face eachother on Saturday and so there is a goood chance that their nearest rivals do drop points.

However, it makes it all the more important that the Rams ensure that they win against Leyton Orient to make sure they keep pace and maybe even regain control of the promotion race.

The upshot of it is that because the Rams failed to win yesterday, it makes it all the more likely that the competiton for second place will come down to the last game of the season, if it couldn’t be tense enough already.