104th minute penalty saves a point for Ipswich against Derby County

A last gasp penalty by Jack Clarke saved a precious point for Ipswich after coming from 2-1 behind against Derby County at Portman Road yesterday.

He struck from 12 yards in the 104th minute of added time after Jack Taylor was fouled in the box by the Rams’ David Ozoh.

Unphased by the pressure on him the Ipswich substitute stepped forward to ram the ball past the Derby goalkeeper Jacob Zetterstrom.

It was a game of two penalties while another was controversially turned down by referee Lee Doughty after striker George Hirst appeared to be fouled in the area by Matt Clark.

Instead the man in the middle booked Hirst for simulation and he also missed what looked like a stamp on Jens Cajuste by former Town loanee Lewis Travis.

Earlier Jacob Greaves gave the home side the lead via a corner on 33 minutes but former Luton striker Carlton Morris drew the sides level from the penalty spot after 50 minutes and they went ahead through a fine strike by Rhian Brewster in the 70th minute.

Then Clarke stepped up  in the 106th minute to bring the sides level.

With the international break ahead both sides are still seeking their first win of the season after just four games.

Ipswich, who were relegated from the Premier League, dropped to 21st place in the Championship, while Derby, who gained promotion from League One, a place below them in 22nd spot.

Derby head coach John Eustate told BBC Radio Derby he was “really, really disappointed” to concede [the equaliser].

He added: “I think that’s a world record amount of time ever added to any game. I’ve never seen that amount of minutes before.

“The lads battled, worked their socks off and we deserved the three points. What an effort that was from a group of players who are going to grow throughout the season.

“I think there’s some really good signs for where we want to get to and I was really proud of the effort.

“You can see everyone is gathering speed, getting fit. The club have been brilliant with the signings we’ve made. There is lots to be happy with moving forward.”

Meanwhile Ipswich boss Kieran McKenna told BBC Radio Suffolk: “Hopefully it’ll be a big moment for us at the end.

“The group has been through a lot and the club has been through a lot over the summer.

“It’s been a challenging summer so it’s a nice moment to go into the international break – a big thing for us to get a late goal here.

“I think the performances have been getting better every week as players have been getting up to speed and integrated.

“It’s really frustrating – we know we need to win sooner rather than later but you can’t wish yourself there, it’s only about learning lessons that you get there.

And he complained at the way the game was played saying: “It was barely a football match made worse by a bad refereeing decision that should have given us the opportunity to go 2-1 up, but us conceding a really poor goal on another long ball that we do not defend well enough.

“There was almost no ball in play for most of the time and we were not able to get any rhythm in the game to build any attacks that we wanted to build.”