​SHAUN Barker feels Derby County must start to improve their poor away record to ease the pressure on home games.

Only

11 points from 54 on the road has left the Rams with the second worst

away record in the Championship as they prepare to take on Sheffield

Wednesday at Hillsborough on Saturday.

Derby’s two wins have come at

Watford and Peterborough United, while five away draws have been gained

against Blackpool, Leicester City, Preston North End, Newcastle United

and Sheffield United.

Four of the last five away games have been

lost and the struggle for points continues to turn the heat on the Rams

when they return to Pride Park.

“We spoke about it a month ago and

said how things were picking up slightly away from home, with better

performances and better results and looking more solid, and now we’ve

had three away defeats on the run,” said Barker.

“I said earlier in

the season that our poor away form puts too much pressure on our home

games and every one becomes almost a must-win.

“You don’t want to go into your home games like that, you want to go in with a bit more confidence.”

Back-to-back

away defeats at Reading and Doncaster piled the pressure on Tuesday’s

home clash with Middlesbrough but Derby’s record of delivering results

at Pride Park when they are needed has been good.

They beat Sheffield Wednesday, Coventry City and Reading earlier this season after losing  at Cardiff, Ipswich and Swansea.

Defeat

at Plymouth was followed by a thoroughly-deserved victory over

Nottingham Forest and goals from Michael Tonge and Chris Porter

defeated Watford in the game after the Rams had fallen 3-1 to West

Bromwich Albion at the Hawthorns.

By contrast, Derby have the eighth best home record in the division.

“There is a marked difference. The home displays have been up-and-at-them performances,” said manager Nigel Clough.

Derby certainly got after Middlesbrough in a 30-minute spell in the second half of Tuesday’s 2-2 draw.

They

trailed at half-time but Porter and Tonge struck in the space of eight

minutes to put Clough’s side 2-1 up only for them to be denied victory

by a last-minute header from substitute Leroy Lita.

“Middlesbrough

are a good team, they keep the ball well and have a lot of experience.

Pretty much all of their players have played in the Premier League or

the Scottish Premier League,” said Clough.

“It was disappointing not to win when leading so late in the game but it was a good point considering the circumstances.”

The point increased the gap between themselves and the bottom three to five points.

Derby remain in 18th place while Saturday’s opponents Sheffield Wednesday are four points below them.

“If

you’re playing teams around you – and you’ve heard it so many times –

they are six-pointers,” said Barker, who joined Derby from Blackpool in

the summer.

“At the very least, we need to make sure we get a point in the games against teams around us,” he added.

“It’s

been a stop-start season. We’ve had a couple of runs where we found

ourselves in a good position following a couple of fantastic results

against big sides where you think ‘here we go, we can push on now’.

“Then you have a couple of bad results and performances.

“That’s this league. Unless you’re in the top six, going into every game expecting to win, anyone can beat anyone on their day.

“That’s

what makes it a tough league to stay in and big clubs have found

themselves going out of this league because they didn’t perform

consistenly enough. A month ago we were hoping to finish in the top

half of the table. I’m not thinking about that now, I’m thinking of

getting safe.

“We know we’ve got a tough job on our hands, with

tough games coming up, like against Sheffield Wednesday who are at home

and below us.

“They’ll be expecting to get three points from that as well.

“Every single game is going to be a tough one so we’ve got to make sure we’re at the races.”

Derby

have four more home games against Leicester, Ipswich, Crystal Palace

and Cardiff. Any points they can collect on the road will ease the

pressure on those fixtures as they look to secure their safety in the

Championship.