Davies: Critics inspired Rams

The Rams secured a return to the Premiership with a 1-0 victory over West Brom in the Coca-Cola Championship play-off final, courtesy of Stephen Pearson's second-half goal at Wembley, just a season after Davies took charge of the club after they narrowly avoided relegation to League One last term.

Davies said: "To be in this position over such a short period of time, I'd like to thank everyone at the club who has supported us and everyone around about the club who have constantly criticised the players and put the boot in at times when it was unnecessary. We thank them for the inspiration."

With the Scot having spent big under the new ownership at Pride Park, Derby came up just short of automatic promotion but Davies is still bristling at what he perceives has been a lack of patience around the east midlands club.

He said: "It seems, at certain clubs, you can normally take three or four years to build a team. At Derby County, in many different factions of Derby County, doing it over 10 or 11 months is a must and if you don't do it over that period you get hyper-criticised, which is astounding for me.

"We were bringing in players bit by bit and, with so much to change, we'd be where we wanted to be over a three-year period. They [the players] didn't deserve it [criticism]. '[Steve] Howard was a waste of money, [Craig] Fagan was poor, [Matt] Oakley was poor, he was poor and he was poor'.

"I kept hearing it all over the place and it was the timescale that disappointed me. The one thing we've lacked is patience in my opinion. There was heavy criticism of players who hadn't been in the club for two minutes. Families weren't settled, kids weren't in schools, houses were still to be found but it's been an inspiration for us."

Davies, who has confirmed he wants to keep on-loan West Ham defender Tyrone Mears, claims the fact his side's destiny has only just been resolved means he has not had the opportunity to think about next season.

The former Motherwell and Preston boss, who has refused to confirm he will in charge at Pride Park next season, is set for key talks with the Derby hierarchy over the next couple of weeks.

"I haven't looked at anything. I haven't spoken to out-of-contract players, thought about Premiership football or Championship football. The only thing I've focused on is the play-offs, getting to the final and doing nothing else except making this club a Premiership club."