Like Preston and Derby before...Billy Davies brings Forest down to his level
1 -v- 1 
Wednesday Forest
Ok….I was looking right forward to this game…
Sun shining first thing in the morning, first game back at Hillsborough for a couple of weeks, having been holiday…I dunno…this was a good day for footy.
Get me ablutions done, bring out the lucky aftershave, realise it’s chuffing warmer than I thought and change me jeans for me shorts, the young un arrives and we’re off…and she’s in a good mood too…not often that happens, both of us full of the joys…
An 80’s music love fest on the way, always adds to the mood….Oh aye…a cracking day ahead without a doubt…
When we get into the ground, we can see Forest have brought a decent few with em and the crowd looks good…
THE MATCH
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I’ve discussed with folk since the game and it’s certainly got a few of us divided…
Now if you were expecting the Forest of old, the lovely football, the team that could play, that tried, that took the game to their opponents then think again…that Forest is now dead.
 | This is Billy Davies’ Forest. Just like Preston, just like Derby…they are not pretty…in fact, they’re down right ugly. OK, fair enough, them sort of tactics will get you a reasonable return a lot of the time but it’s not nice to watch. You can guarantee though that the only person that doesn't see it like that is Billy. It's always the opposition teams that are poor. |
I was surprised there wasn’t a red card in this game if I’m honest as it looked set to go up at times, but it probably stopped just short of that…
They were into us right from the off were Forest and we’d hardly been in our seats when they attacked down the left, skipped past a sliding tackle from Woody…absolutely perfect ball into the box and they should have scored but credit to Granty, he got down quick and low and palmed it away with Purse tidying up, from the resulting corner we seemed to be all over the place but eventually looked to have got the ball clear…LOOKED to have got it clear…but not…it came back in and Blackstock had acres of space to nod the ball home.
Now for me, Granty should have come forward and claimed this.
It looked a good ball for the keeper…either punch it…or even catch it, just take it off his head.
It may be harsh but to me he just planted his feet and never moved….disappointing to say the least…we were a couple of minutes into the game and behind already…The Forest fans were loving it and making plenty of noise.
If they’d stuck to this pattern of play I think we’d have been in trouble but they didn’t and we got plenty of play once we’d settled into the game… We survived the opening 20 minutes flurry and even had a wonderful move in there ourselves…a cracking tackle from Tommy on the edge of the box and he comes out with the ball, several quick, sharp, decisive passes later and the ball’s up the other end… OK, the end result wasn’t good but it gave us hope. |  |
Instead of concentrating on their own game though and actually trying to take us apart with football, they decided to try and dismantle us literally, limb from limb, as some crunching tackles went in and a couple of yellow cards were issued…In truth, I was surprised there weren’t more. The ref was quite lenient but it worked I suppose as the game didn’t kick off.
We’d worked our way into the game well just before half time and probably had the lions share of possession now…also, we’d started getting a few shots off…OK, not so many on target and quite a few were being blocked by a decent, strong Forest defence. I have to say, they may not be a nice side but I thought some of their defending was excellent
Anyway, chipped away at them and eventually got the breakthrough…the ball drops to Tudders just inside the box and he hits low and hard…into the net and we’re level…no less than we deserved by now.
You should have seen the reaction from Granty!
He went fookin ballistic...turning to the kop and pumping the air...jumping up and down...really giving it some...he was all over it....really great to see.
You can take the lad out of Derby.....
 | At halftime there were cheers for former Forest and Wednesday old
boys…as they came onto the pitch. First up was Nigel Jemson and a warm friendly cheer... but a fablious cheer and great round of applause was saved for Des Walker, with all sides chanting, ‘You’ll Never Beat Des Walker’…he saluted all 4 sides too…it was a fur up wonderful moment…a cracker TBH and a good move by the club. |  |
We came out with a bit of spark to us in the second half, the goal had obviously perked us up and Varney was a little unlucky early on after a bit of a goalmouth scramble…. Woody went up for the ball, but ended up on his back, with players still on top of him…and he STILL tried to head the ball…Varney just couldn’t get on the end of the loose ball, bit unlucky but promising…but the best chance, again, was for Forest when yet again Buxton was mullered royally and Forest got the ball right across the 6yard box…it just wanted prodding home…but there was no one there…A right let off.
We then had a cracking bit of possession football with some decent movement and passing including the best move of the match, it involved Gray, Miller, Potter and of course Tudgay…it deserved a better ending but it was lovely to watch as they passed and moved for each other…it gives you hope when you see football like that IMO.
Again though, they still had a better chance on goal than we did with a wonderful shot from Anderson that looked all over a goal from our view….it was met by an equally wonderful save from Granty who was now playing out of his skin…
There was a moment in the second half that was worth the price of admission alone..a tackle…from Gray
We lost possession and Gray was like leetnin…straight in there, a foot in and out with the ball, quick as ya like and turned it into an attacking move…superb it was.
 | There was also a moment just after that, that reminded me, as much as I really love Lewis Buxton, what we miss from Frank Simek at his best…Lewis had the ball on the edge of their box…in typical Frankie position…he looked up…there was a path into the box and towards goal…he chose to pass the ball across the edge of the box….Frankie would have been all over that…doing that driving run into the box he used to do…past the defenders and there was either a shot at the end or penalty as some gret clod tripped him up….I don’t think Frankie will get in the team ahead of Lewis, despite this poor performance from Buxton, but we certainly miss a lot of his game. |
Both sides had reasonable chances late on, us with a free kick on the edge of the box that Potter put into the kop and Forest as they pushed for a late winner from a corner…
It fizzled out to a draw and TBH…it was a fair result with neither side doing enough to warrant the 3 points.
As much as I didn’t enjoy watching Forest…same as I didn’t enjoy Davies’ previous teams…it’s dreadful….but it’s effective.
They had a plan…they came top ours and they left unbeaten…Job done.
We aren’t going to win all our games but I’m confident we’re a better side than they are and will have a much better season….
A few points…
Lewis had a mare today…Anderson could stroll past him with ease, any and every time he tried…We know he’s usually dependable and we know he’s not the quickest…he’s no slouch like, but against these nippier wingers he’s going to struggle…he needs help with players like that.
Varney also had a very quiet game, never got a sniff…some reasonable defending from Forest but like Jeffers before him, he isn’t helped by Granty hoofing the ball downfield…it gets swallowed by the big defenders and Varney looks shit….far too many times we did this and it didn’t work once….in fact, I can’t remember many, if any, time sit HAS worked. (Yeah, I know…that’s not saying much since I can’t remember breakfast today with my shit memory)
Something else that struck me was our throw ins….I thought we’d stopped this years ago but evidently not…we seem incapable of keeping possession from our own throw ins…something that used to annoy the late, great, Sir Bobby Robson too…we MUST make more of our throw ins and we MUST at least make sure our own players get on the end of them.
We concede possession too easily from throws and long kicks from the keeper and it’s unnecessary, we can play the ball on the deck as well as most in this division, we need to do that more often as the aerial route definitely aint working.
There is however, STILL plenty to like about our side.
Tommy Spurr had his best game of the season.
He was very good in defence but just as good going forward. His passing and tackling were excellent today, well done to the youth
There’s plenty to like about Miller and Potter IMHO.
I know everyone, including the manager thought it was a bad move to play them together…well, maybe for THIS game, with the type of ugly football Forest played but I don’t remember too many things coming through the middle to cause us problems and had we not hoofed the ball over them as much maybe Miller and Potter would have produced more. The passing is better IMO with those two together.
Gray had a very good game again and he’s going to be very important to us through the season.
He showed his wonderful abilities as a winger and he showed us glimpses of just how good he is defensively too…
 | Tudders…I admit, when he went off I was happy to settle for the draw. For all the considerable abilities that our other players bring to the game there are none so vital as what Tudders gives us… He didn’t lose a header all day…he defends, he runs, he attacks, he shoots and crucially…HE FOOKIN SCORES! I can’t think of a more impressive or more important player for us over recent years…and although it’s been said before, he is by far the best signing we’ve made this season and for a good few years. |
Anyway…let’s move on and hope we can get back to winning ways on Tuesday against Boro.
Cheers
Steve:Beastie
Owls Alive