The statistics are compelling: Derby have taken seven points from 15 games without Taribo West, 20 from 11 with him. Those 15 include two since he joined on three-month loan from Milan. Both were lost, one last week at Charlton, when West failed to return from Nigerian World Cup duty.

It was not quite fatted-calf time when he showed up on Friday but his manager Jim Smith sacrificed disciplinarian tendencies on the altar of discretion and wrapped his irritation in relief.

And on Saturday's evidence the manager is rightly desperate to extend West's three-month loan to the end of the season. It is not just his defensive strength or his quick eye for the break. By results alone he has become totemic: different culture, different hair, different class.

The goal seemed almost unintentional. Adam Murray played the ball innocuously through, but Stefano Eranio chased and crossed and Craig Burley, getting more forward with fuller fitness, swept it in.

Peter Reid was less perturbed than he might have been. "We had good possession but the final pass was not there," he said. He must be wary that Sunderland do not throw away the good work that has put them in the running for a Champions League place.

DERBY: Oakes, Riggott, Carbonari, West, Delap (O'Neil 57), Eranio, Burley, Powell (Murray 34), Boertien, Burton, Christie (Morris 45). Subs Not Used: Higginbotham, Grant. Booked: Powell, Christie, Eranio, Morris, Burley, Carbonari, Riggott. Goal: Burley 42.

SUNDERLAND: Sorensen, Williams, Varga, Craddock, Gray, Rae, Hutchison, McCann, Schwarz (Oster 82), Phillips, Dichio. Subs Not Used: Ingham, Makin, Kilbane, Thirlwell. Booked: Hutchison, Dichio, Phillips.

Referee: B Knight (Orpington).