Paul Warne's last words as Derby County head coach and why he ...

Derby County have sacked Paul Warne after a run of seven straight defeats in the Championship left them in the relegation zone.

Rams owner David Clowes made the reluctant decision on Friday with first-team coach Matt Hamshaw placed in charge for tomorrow's game against Norwich City.

As the club now looks to appoint a successor, here is what Paul Warne had to say about his future and the January transfer window in what proved to be his final pre-match press conference.

On the January transfer window

"Not let down because I'm one of the lucky ones who sees what goes on. I would have liked obviously more power at the top of the pitch because we're losing games, but we're losing games by one goal.

"We're not being outplayed, I don't think defensively, but in possession, we just need to give ourselves more chances to score. That is inclusive of bringing players at the top end of the pitch, so that's my disappointment, and I know they're the hardest to get.

"I can't give out names, but we did have a centre forward that was coming in and a wide player that was coming in," he said. "It was all on, but at the last moment the club changes their mind, not our club, but their club. There is not much more we can do on that.

"I saw how much was going on. Everybody was in every day and the recruiters have actually lived here for over a week. But as soon as the window opens, as it always does, it's not as as simplistic as people might think. You have your first target, your second target and your third target and then you just move down the line, everything's easy. But it isn't like that.

"I wasn't the only one in this window trying to strengthen the top line. I don't have a regret, but I would obviously have liked more. Every window is difficult. If you're setting out to get a goalkeeper, it's probably easy. If you're setting out to get someone along the back line, it's probably easier.

"The further up the pitch you go it isn't. Some teams in this league have bought two million pounds strikers and then loaning them out six months later or getting them from the under-21s at Premier League clubs and then they go back.

"But I do think strengthening along the top line is the hardest. I'm pleased with the players that we have got, but we did need strengthening. I do agree with that. It was just disappointing that we didn't get the targets that I think the squad needed and the fans would have enjoyed watching."

On his future

"I can't live on the whole we've lost so many games on the spin, I can't. In the same way last year, and this sounds really arrogant, I didn't live off the fact that we broke records away from home or scored the most goals. I'm like, that's not what it's about for me, it's always the next game and look I could manage this club which will disappoint a lot of people for the next 3,000 days.

"I could manage this club for the next 3000 minutes. My job is to get the best out of this group, make them feel confident, perform at the highest level they can and try and win games. And that's what we always do. We won't detract from that. It's just the fact that at the moment in time as a club, staff and players, we're just in a bad spot that we didn't want to be in.

"I've said from the start of the season that we wanted to really push the club forward, and we found ourselves on a sticky wicket. We've got a lot of games left. We're really positive as I am with my staff and my players. I haven't had any conversations (about my job) and I wouldn't expect it.

"In fairness, if the owner phoned me up and said, look, Paul, don't worry about your job - respectfully, you just don't have them conversations. I just work here until I'm not working here. There isn't possibly the same amount of clarity on the terracing, but I work for the board. That's that's who I work for. I want the lads to perform well so the terraces enjoythe team play and win. But I don't wake up in the morning and think, oh, today I'm in trouble. I don't, why, why would I?

"If I did that, I wouldn't be very good at my job. I would struggle. I'll always stand in front of the lads, I'll always be honest, I'll always try and motivate them to try and get them to win football games. When the day comes that I don't manage this club, I won't look back at with any regret. We've done everything we could. We've got the team up when we were asked to. We've tried to set out a way to play this year.

"We have been a little bit, and this is a bit of reasoning, we have been a bit unfortunate with injuries, which has sort of killed us. But that doesn't mean we're not like eight points adrift, but I do understand that, you know, six to seven weeks ago, the league looked completely different. On Boxing Day everything looks good. Since then we've narrowly lost a lot of games, which is disappointing. But I'm still really proud of how the lads have had to play out of position and dig in and how hard they work out of possession. But I do also get that we haven't been as ruthless in the final third to help us, and that's the honest truth."

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