Derby County manager Steve McClaren admitted that his side had to dig deep to take a point during their 2-2 draw with Norwich City.

The Canaries needed a late equaliser from Steven Whittaker to secure a draw, but the former England boss insists that the stalemate was a good result following a string of challenging fixtures.

"You can't play away at Middlesbrough and then at home here against Chelsea and not have a dip energy wise and emotion wise and I think we saw that in the first 20 minutes," he told Derby's official website.

"There was no life or tempo to the game and you could see that Norwich are a very good team. The players, after that first 20 minutes, really raised the tempo and got the goal.

"It was one of those afternoons where there was a lot of mistakes, we had to dig in and we very nearly pulled it off."

The result leaves Derby in fifth place in the Championship, while Norwich occupy seventh spot.