Derby snatch precious point as two men are sent packing

Nine-man Derby County scraped a precious point from a volatile Valley Parade match after their skipper, Rob Lee, and Adam Murray both saw red. Lee was dismissed in the 72nd minute for two bookable offences, both for fouls on Bradford midfielder Stephen Warnock.

Youngster Murray, who had also been booked earlier, then followed suit in added time for a challenge on Mark Bower. The resulting red card, which will mean a three-match suspension, left Murray in tears and provoked his manager, John Gregory, into accusing the referee Neale Barry of lacking "any common sense".

Gregory acknowledged: "Murray's was a reckless challenge. He has gone in there with studs up and has cut someone in half. But at that stage of the game the referee had a choice of either straight red or a yellow. He decided to produce the straight red, which in turn pleased the home fans, which he tended to do for most of the 90 minutes. Adam is devastated. He has cried his eyes out because he feels he has let himself and the team down, but he hasn't, he has worked very hard."

But the dismissals left Bradford with little time to capitalise on their numerical advantage and City's manager, Nicky Law, felt that Lee's red card could have worked against his team.

"In a way, the sending-off didn't help us, because Derby put more men behind the ball have that," Law said. "Before the sending-off we looked more likely to get the one goal that would win it. We were making good openings, but then making the wrong decisions in the box. Whether that's a confidence thing I don't know, but overall this is a game we should have won."

City are now unbeaten in all seven home matches this season, but they have drawn six of those as they battle for First Division survival this season. Indeed, on this evidence, any hope either side harboured of reaching the play-offs looks destined to be disappointed.

Derby found themselves on the back foot for the opening 20 minutes, although the opportunities that fell Bradford's way were inconclusive. The visitors had to wait until the 25th minute for what proved to be their best opening of the game as Izale McLeod and Murray linked superbly in a breakaway move which resulted in the latter driving in a right-foot shot which forced a fine save from on-loan keeper Steve Banks.

Seven minutes from the break Bradford should have taken the lead when Michael Proctor surged into the Derby area before picking out Ashley Ward at the far post. The former Derby striker failed to get a clean contact on his shot, which resulted in the ball ballooning up in the air, only for Mart Poom somehow to prevent the chance from dropping over the goal-line.

The second half was then more notable for the flurry of yellow cards from Barry, which began just after the restart with the first for Lee. McLeod and Murray followed just before the hour mark. But Bradford failed to make headway in the closing stages, despite their numerical advantage.

Bradford City 0 Derby County 0

Attendance: 13,385