Derby County have plenty of work do with disgraced duo Tom Lawrence and Mason Bennett, following their convictions for drink driving.
Lawrence and Bennett appeared in court on Tuesday to be sentenced following a crash on the A6 just outside Duffield on September 24, and were slapped with two-year driving bans, along with a 12-month community order which will see them carry out 180 hours of unpaid community work.
But Derby, who have fined both players for their part in the crash which left captain Richard Keogh out of action for more than a year, say they will learn harsh lessons from the episode to ensure a similar situation doesn’t happen again.
“There is plenty of work to do on our behalf,” said Rams director of communications Nick Britten in conversation with Derbyshire Live.
"There are two parts to this,” continued Britton.
"We want to draw a line under this particular episode, this situation.
"However, it's very important that the reverberations carry on, because we want to learn, we want to improve, we want to make sure this doesn't happen again.
"As part of that, we will of course look at the way this event occurred, look at the processes that we've got installed at the club, look at where we can improve.
"Because although this was ultimately an individual decision made by a small group of players, we have to look as a club to see, can we do better here, can we learn from this?'
"The main thing we want to use this as is a catalyst for getting a greater understanding of how it has affected the society around us.
“Getting closer to supporters, getting the players much closer to the communities through Derby County Community Trust and getting them more involved in that, as well as the 80 hours we've imposed on Lawrence and Bennett (as part of the club's internal disciplinary).
"Really we just want to build, and rebuild where required, our links with the community. Because some good has to come out of this, it really does. We have to learn from this.
"Apart from the individual learning points for the likes of Tom and Mason, and their individual responsibilities, in a wider sense we want to really make sure the club is very much at the heart of the community.
"We are very much together, one club, and we're very much taking forward a one-club approach,” said Britten, who revealed that both the Rams and the two players accept the judgement handed down by Jonathan Taaffe at Southern Derbyshire Magistrates Court.
"There is plenty of work to do on our behalf, and we want to make sure that this really horrible incident, we can use that as a springboard to doing that."
"We very much accept the sentence handed down by the courts.
"We think it's fair and proportionate, and the players accept it."
