Manager Davies leaves Derby County

DERBY, England -- Derby County, the English Premier League's bottom club, have parted company with manager Billy Davies.

Davies had a contract at Derby which ran to 2010.

County chairman Adam Pearson said that it had been mutually decided, "in the interests of both parties that to go our separate ways is the correct decision at this time."

Derby have managed a solitary victory in 14 league outings, 10 of which have ended in defeat.

Academy chief Kevin Thelwell will take charge of the team for Saturday's match away to fellow relegation candidates Sunderland.

Pearson said: "Billy Davies leaves Derby County with our best wishes and our genuine gratitude in achieving a magnificent promotion to the Premier League, where everyone connected with the club wanted to be.

"We wish Billy all the best for his future career and both parties will now move forward, which I am sure will lead to future success for Billy Davies and Derby County."

Davies arrived at Pride Park 18 months ago and took the club back into the Premiership with success in the post-season play-offs.

Davies's last game in charge of County was Saturday's 2-0 league defeat at home to Chelsea.

Last July Davies signed a contract extension which should have kept him at Pride Park until 2010.

County's chairman at the time, Peter Gadsby, said: "This is very good news and I would say it is like a new signing,"

After Saturday's defeat Davies had expressed his desire to see Pearson to talk about new signings.

"I have not spoken to the chairman for three weeks - but it would be nice if I could see him before Christmas," he said in The Sun newspaper on Monday.

"I've had some contact over the phone but we'll see what happens. Will I see him this week? That's a million dollar question but I'm not going to ask to see him."

Davies said he had three players targeted and felt that the club needed to spend £40 million ($82.85 million) in order to avoid relegation.

"I've identified three players out of the six I feel we need. But there's no point talking about X, Y and Z player until I know what we've got to spend, otherwise I'm wasting my time," he added.

"We all know how the finances of this club have been turned round.

"This club has been turned round tremendously well but now hopefully with overseas investment, I'd like to think it will go to the playing side.

"In my opinion, this club had to spend a minimum £40 million to compete - over the two transfer windows.

"But there's nine players out there that played in the Championship last year - that's a Championship squad. These players know the situation.

"The team we have at the moment is not good enough to compete in the Premier League."

After the announcement of his departure on Monday Davies told Sky Sports: "That's football. We know the situation but as far as I am concerned, and I've said this before, these players and the staff have been a pleasure to work with and I've thoroughly enjoyed the great times I've had at Derby County.

"But it is time to move on."

Davies's last game in charge of County was Saturday's 2-0 league defeat at home to Chelsea.

Former Rangers player Davies started his managerial career at Motherwell but, after taking them to the brink of European football, was sacked after a run of poor performances.

He became assistant manager at Preston and stepped up when Craig Brown left the club. He took them into the playoffs for the Premiership in two successive seasons but tasted failure on both occasions.

He switched to Derby in June 2006 and when he took them into the playoffs they were successful with a 1-0 win over West Bromwich in a game thought to be worth £60 million ($124.1 million) to the winners.

The team has struggled from the start in the Premier League, with one success, a 1-0 defeat of Newcastle, to show for their efforts.

Yet, even though they sit at the bottom with a mere six points, they are only four points adrift of 17th placed Middlesbrough.

Former England coach Steve McClaren was promptly installed by leading British bookmaker Ladbrokes as the favorite to replace Davies at odds of 5/2.

McClaren was sacked from his post with the national team last week, after the failure to qualify for the finals of the European Championships.

There has been plenty of activity amongst English Premier league coaches this season.

Davies was the sixth manager in the 20-strong league to leave his job this season.

Jose Mourinho's departure from Chelsea was followed by Martin Jol's exit from Tottenham, Sammy Lee's sacking by Bolton, Chris Hutchings's ousting by Wigan and Steve Bruce's departure from Birmingham.

Bruce left the midlands club to succeed Hutchings at Wigan and is confident the club can survive in the Premier League -- if its players stop underachieving.

Bruce, officially introduced as Wigan manager on Monday, said there were "some fantastic players at this football club, and as a group they should be doing far better than they are."

Wigan is 19th in the Premier League, with two wins and eight points from 14 matches.

Bruce's unveiling as manager of the north England team was held up for five days over an image rights issue with his former club Birmingham.

"It's become a bit of a laughing stock," Bruce said. "But things in contracts should, I believe, remain private and it was unfortunate it was addressed in the media.

"I always knew it would get resolved but it has left a bad taste in the mouth after six years of decent service to the football club." E-mail to a friend