On the day itself, Rotherham took an 8th-minute lead at Cardiff through Lewis Wing which saw them leapfrog both Derby and Sheffield Wednesday early on. Colin Kazim-Richard had a goal disallowed for Derby before Sam Hutchinson scored in the fourth-minute of first half injury time to give Wednesday a 1–0 lead. Derby ended the first half 23rd in the league and level on points with Wycombe Wanderers (who were winning 2–0 at Middlesbrough) but with a superior goal-difference. Due to an injury to Martyn Waghorn causing the first half to finish late, Derby kicked the second half off nine minutes behind Cardiff v Rotherham. Derby started the second half quickly and scored two goals in four minutes through Waghorn (49 mins) and Patrick Roberts first for the club (52 mins) seeing Derby leapfrog back out of the relegation zone for 10 minutes before Callum Paterson equalized on 62 minutes to see Derby drop back to 22nd, and things got even worse for the Rams when Julian Börner gave Sheffield Wednesday a 3–2 lead in the 69th minute. With 15 minutes left to play at Derby, and 5 minutes remaining at Rotherham, Derby were 23rd in the table, with Wednesday also in the relegation zone (22nd) and Rotherham safe in 21st. However, in the space of ninety seconds Derby were awarded a penalty, Marlon Pack scored an 88th-minute equalizer for Cardiff against Rotherham to make the score 1-1, and then Martyn Waghorn converted Derby's penalty (79 mins) to make the score 3–3 at Pride Park. This meant that 21st place was held by all three sides battling the drop in the space of 90 seconds, with Wednesday safe for all of twenty seconds before Derby leapfrogged them. With Rotherham finishing 1-1, Derby knew that holding on for the final 10 minutes would see them stay up, which they were successfully able to do and stayed up in 21st, one point ahead of Wycombe in 22nd, who won 3–0 at Middlesbrough. Post-season The day after the conclusion of the 2020-21 campaign, Derby issued a formal apology to supporters for the previous campaign, finishing by stating "We know that your dedication and love for the club is deserving of so much more and we will endeavour to restore your pride." However, there was still a threat of potential relegation hanging over the club as there remained fears of a potential points deduction with