Through the seasons before us..

We’re now onto the really dubious musical detritus that our beloved Reds have inspired. This little number is contributed to us courtesy of a chap called Vic Blackwell, and ‘Forest fans‘ whoever they might be. We are returning back to the late 70’s/early 80’s so plenty of references to the European Cup winning team. Vic Blackwell himself is presumably responsible for the dubious Brian Clough impersonation that forms the lead vocals, whilst the Forest fans comprise of patrons of numerous fictitious pubs as well as a girls and boys choir to boot.

This song very much belongs in the ‘best forgotten’ camp of music, particularly the sections featuring a very camp sounding group of fans proclaiming themselves as queens, and a rather politically non-correct tribal contribution from a group of ‘fans’ from a pub called ‘The Shrunken Head!’ Despite all this, if you can tolerate listening to the song right until the end, the track does redeem itself slightly with a not-so-sly dig at Liverpool FC, which is nice for those of us who remember a time when we were often rightfully uttered in the same breath as the regrettably more-illustrious Reds of Merseyside.

I’m not sure whether the photograph is the actual Vic Blackwell featured on the record, but I hope so as I found it quite amusing! The song is simply entitled ‘Nottingham Forest‘ - enjoy!

It’s that time isn’t it?  We all spend inordinate amounts of time looking at league tables working out all manner of permutations and combinations of results.  From my own fiddlings with the figures, I still think we’re on course for a playoff finish and not much more, although there are a few interesting scenarios that could take place.  Bristol are of course four points ahead of us, they have +2 goal difference, as things stand we have scored two more goals than them.

Now there are two factors at play that determine our finishing position - the first thing is in our control, because it is our results.  We need three wins, I feel, to stand any chance at all.  The second factor is the dubious one (well, us getting three wins is quite dubious, but anyway!) - and that is that we need Bristol to drop points in two games out of the remaining three.  Whilst they undoubtedly have a trickier run in than us, I think that might be a bit too much for us to ask.

I don’t see why we can’t get a win against Bournemouth on saturday, against Orient away and indeed against Crewe at home.  If the players give it large, and if we play to our potential, then it should be doable.  Of course, I have said as much on plenty of occasions when it turns out our players didn’t do that, and we end up losing or drawing - but let’s be positive for a moment, and work on the assumption that we win each of our remaining games.

Bristol’s next game is a toughie - they have a long trip to in-form Carlisle, who are on a rather impressive run of five straight wins in the league.  So it is not remotely beyond the realms of possibility that they will drop points at the weekend.  Next up they face Millwall away - a shorter trip, but again, they face a team on a good run of form, four games unbeaten including a win against our good selves.  Their final game is against relegated Rotherham at Ashton Gate - I find it hard to imagine any upsets happening there.

So effectively, if Bristol lose against either Carlisle or Millwall, and draw the other - whilst we win all our games - we’re up.  Two draws and and a win, and it becomes interesting, because we would be equal on points.  So it would come down to goal difference in the first instance - currently Bristol have +2 on us, however if they draw two and we win two, we will be at least equal on goal difference - depending on how many we win by.  So there’s the possibility that we could end up very close indeed.  Imagine they drew both games, we won both of ours by 1-0, it would make goal difference equal.  Now imagine they draw both games 2-2 and we win both games 1-0, we would be equal on goal difference, and on goals scored!

In that scenario it would all come down to the last day of the season - if we matched each other’s result in terms of scoreline, we’d get second by virtue of beating them at the City Ground thanks to Nicky Southall’s freekick (thanks to the kind poster on LTLF who actually worked out much of this!), as points, goal difference and goals scored would all be equal.  Of course, I don’t for a minute expect that to happen - but what an amusing way to get promotion if it did!

The bottom line is, if we don’t win against Bournemouth on saturday I think we can forget it - and if we do win, and Bristol beat Carlisle, then I also think it unlikely we’ll catch them.  The most important thing for us is our results - to stand any chance of automatic promotion we need three wins, and even if we do that - if Bristol manage to win two of their games, it still won’t be enough anyway, but we will still enter the playoffs on a very positive run of results - which is important.

So to conclude, there is no conclusion - rather obviously we need to win our games, and hope that Carlisle, Millwall or - inconceivably - Rotherham can do us some big favours along the way to enable us to sneak into second.  It’s certainly not impossible, I still maintain it’s unlikely and think Bristol will just do enough to hold onto the second automatic spot - but certainly, as Smoulders keeps saying, it is proving to be an exciting climax to the season.  It’d still rather be where Scunthorpe are, though, and I haven’t even considered the rise of Blackpool up the table - argh!

Take yourself back to 1991, the mighty Nottingham Forest had reached the FA Cup final to face Terry Venable’s Tottenham, and indeed, the mesmerising Paul Gascoigne on what was - at that time - our annual trip to Wembley to sing for Brian Clough’s army. I seem to recall there was some kind of bland official type song that was released to commemorate this occasion - this track was a rather less than official one.

Simply entitled ‘Brian’ - it is very much centred around the fact that our charismatic leader had every piece of silverware going except for the FA Cup, which of course was ever to elude him. Whilst it lacks in musical dexterity or verve, it does have a certain charm - of course, it also has the lyrical genius of “Gazza get your hankie out, it’s Forest all the way!” - unfortunately Gazza would only have had a blub about having to leave the field early thanks to injuring himself (damn you, you coward, Roger Milford!).

So, I’m proud to bring you ‘Brian‘ by ‘Fat and Frantic‘ for your listening pleasure!

It seems to have been glossed over in the media comments online so far, but certainly on the radio during the sports bulletins and during the Matchtalk programme tonight, Smoulds was broadcast issuing a broadside at certain sections of the Forest support.  Not making it to Brentford, I’m not qualified to comment on what was or wasn’t said - but the radio presenters speculated in a “I know this..” kind of way that it was the fact that even young Lewis McGugan was apparently subject to jeers when a pass was misplaced.

I have a kind of ambivalent stance on this - on the one hand, I can see Smoulds’ point.  Lewis is learning his trade, and has very much been thrown in at the proverbial deep end - but then, he’s also a professional footballer, he’s done little else other than play football for money since he was young.  I know I get frustrated with myself, and my teammates certainly do, if I misplace passes on a much less important stage than that upon which Lewis plays his football.  And my teammates (fortunately) don’t pay for the privilege of seeing me play!

It is fair to say that turning on the side before half time is largely counter-productive - what on earth happened to that spirit we showed at Oldham - where there was no hope at all, where the team were abject and disgraceful, but the fans cast this aside and made a racket anyway.  That is the kind of spirit we should have in the run in - I can empathise with how infuriating it is to watch Forest, and how you feel like exploding if you weren’t able to let out that rage - but well, I wonder whether we can put that aside for three games (hopefully not any more than that, but well, I suspect it will be!).

On the flip side, whilst it’s all well and good complaining about the nasty supporters - the Forest players would do well to remember that the vast majority of those supporters earn a very modest wage compared to them, and they choose to invest a sizable per cent of it to offer them their support.  Just as I expect our supporters to rise to the challenge, I expect our players to do so too - they may feel hard done by with some comments they’ve been on the receiving end of, but frankly, some performances have deserved it.

So, those fans who feel bruised by Smoulds’ comments but this aside, and the players and Smoulders himself should too - draw a line under it, and everyone involved in the club should focus wholly on our forthcoming fixtures - there’s plenty to complain about and pick the bones over, but equally, there’s a much better time to do it - at the end of the season - for now, we should sing our hearts out for the lads!

I know it’s been less than 24 hours, but I’ve been itching to post this festival of cheese ever since I heard it, so I’m going to! This is track two on the CD, and despite featuring our messiah and saviour, Brian Clough, I’m afraid it doesn’t really elevate it beyond the level of utter dross as far as the music is concerned - and is certainly ample proof that whilst he was a man of many talents, the mighty Brian Clough was never likely to become the first credible white rapper!

Entitled ‘You Can’t Win ‘Em All‘ - it’s a collaboration between the aforementioned football genius, and a chap called J.J. Barrie - who, you will be no doubt pleased to know, features again on the album!

Despite the undeniable awfulness of the music, many of the lyrics, and indeed the whole concept, I warn you now that it is an infuriatingly catchy number which I found myself singing at work earlier much the bafflement of my colleagues - who thankfully, to my knowledge, have never had the pleasure of hearing the record. Not that they would admit it even if they had!

Ladies and gentlemen - you have been warned, but below is the media player that will enable you to take in this audio treat!

A friend of mine gave me a copy of this CD the other day, whilst I’d heard Paper Lace’s anthemic European Cup record, and dimly remembered the ‘Brian’ song from the 1991 FA Cup season, I hadn’t realised that Forest had been sufficiently inspirational to give rise to 20 odd tracks of largely dubious audio. I figured that if I hadn’t realised the breadth and sometimes sheer hilarity of some of these musical offerings, then the chances are many of our fans also hadn’t. A couple of listens and I can see why he wasn’t sad to lose the CD, however I do think there is a morbid fascination in the awful dirge that supporting a football team can inspire!

As such, I’m going to go through them periodically as I find the time - giving you the opportunity to listen to a wonderous and varied myriad of audio nastiness (for that is mostly what is on offer, I’m afraid!), which is perhaps both an opportunity to be amused, but also a timely reminder that generally speaking, football and music are two of life’s pleasures that should not be combined more often than not! We start with perhaps the one you will have heard before - since it is track one on the CD - click the play button below to relive the joys of “We’ve got the whole world in our hands” by Nottingham Forest FC and Paper Lace!

It’s no secret that we wanted to get promoted this season. Be we the fans, the chairman, chief executive, manager or players (well, some of them!). Hell, even some of the media seemed to quite want us to do well! But yesterday was confirmed a dark and brooding piece of news that makes this mission all the more important over coming weeks.You see, dear readers, Walsall have been confirmed as winning promotion from League Two!

For those of you who have never visited, Walsall is the little-documented tenth circle of hell - so fearsome that Dante felt unable to include the fearsomely dull place to his works. This is the place where people are damned to eternal boredom and soul-destroying awfulness that could not be included in his Divine Comedy. That, my friends, is where we would have to visit next season were our promotion bid to fail.

Of course, regardless of the hellish nature of Walsall the place, there is the small matter that we seem incapable of beating them too. Even with the goalscoring prowess of Andy Impey in the side, we could only register a 3-3 draw with them back in 2004. Since then we lost and drew to them in 2005. In fact, to find a Forest win against this bogey-side, you must go back to 1999/2000 when we did the double over them thanks to goals from the likes of Freedman, Chettle and Wright at home, and Rogers and Freedman at their place.

Whilst for everyone failure to go up would be bad, now it promises to hold more dread than any of us could fear - not to mention the slightly far-fetched but nonetheless mathematically possible scenario that we could find ourselves plying our trade in the same division as Notts County next season!

I only stumbled upon this work of genius thanks to Vince commenting on my match report for today’s game at Brentford. By day, he is Vince, but on numerous occasions, he becomes Vince Kong - and you can click here to read about his trip to Millwall to watch Forest!

What an awesome idea, and I look forward to the possibility of meeting Vince Kong on my travels watching the Mighty Reds!

Brentford FC - 2
Nottingham Forest - 4

After about 54 minutes of sitting and seething at the radio, I was quietly grateful I hadn’t invested the time and money to visit Brentford, and was feeling sorry for those that had.  What a difference forty minutes or so can make - a splendid comeback more than made up for the dreadful start and has hopefully repaid some of those supporters who’ve made dreary trips to Millwall or innumerate other poor away performances.  Unfortunately every other bugger in the top four won too, so it’s very much as you were, with three games remaining.

Congratulations must go to Scunthorpe United, who today confirmed promotion with a 2-0 victory over Huddersfield, can you guess who scored the goals?  I bet you can - a Billy Sharp brace confirms promotion to the Championship.  Bristol City beat Yeovil 2-0, and Blackpool registered a 4-1 victory against Northampton.  Meanwhile down at the bottom of the table, Rotherham United are the latest team to be confirmed as relegated, so commiserations to them.

So, back to Griffin Park - it was a first 50 minutes very much to forget (sound familiar).  A very sluggish start with little creativity, Perch opening the chances account with a shot straight at the keeper, and McGugan hit one wide, Grant was put through by Lester but his effort blocked for a corner.  This makes it sound one-way traffic, but it was scrappy.

Brentford took the lead on around 15 minutes, with Pinault skipped past Prutton and chipped the ball over Paul Smith from the edge of the area, it clipping the crossbar and post and ended up just over the line (which had to be confirmed by the Assistant Referee) to give the home side the lead, and a great deal of confidence.  Forest only really contributed a couple of wayward shots from McGugan and Perch in the remainder of the half.

The second half started, and after two minutes it was double the challenge.  Owusu beat Curtis passing to youngster Charlie Ide who smashed the ball past Smith.  This started to wake Forest up - finally a goal from a corner - Commons took it and it was flicked on by Breckin on the near post giving Prutton a relatively easy header at the back post to give us a lifeline.

Commons was starting to play well, and despite being crowded out of a great run he managed to pick out Grant Holt who was able to produce a save from Stuart Nelson in the Brentford goal.  Smith was looking shaky at the other end though, with a bit of dodgy punching.  But we were to get level, 68 minutes on the clock and Perch won the ball, finding Lester who laid it off for Commons who scored with a fierce drive.

A decent come back - but given results elsewhere a draw wasn’t ever going to be enough, so even the most impatient didn’t have to wait too long before Lester was upended in the area by Griffiths.  Grant stepped up and blasted the ball down the middle to give us the lead, and him his 18th goal of the season.  Lester twisted and turned but was thwarted by the keeper shortly after this.

Brentford had brought on a substitute who could (and probably should) have equalised for the Bees with a header from 5 yards unmarked.  Wes Morgan came on at some point, then collapsed holding his ankle and was replaced by Bennett four minutes later!  The final goal came from Commons, again it was Lester providing the clever pass to him putting him clear, to loft the ball over the oncoming Nelson and secure the points.

So well done boys, we needed that - and to come back from 2 down (admittedly, we must ask questions why we were 2 down!) is a great turnaround in performance.  Four goals in one half away from home is impressive too - so we need to take that confidence into all of our remaining games.  Bournemouth up next at the City Ground, whilst Bristol have to go to Carlisle.  I’m still resigned to the play offs - but well, it’s still possible, isn’t it?

And what a great send off for the awful yellow away kit!

I’ve not thought of many ’strange chants’ for a while now, I suppose most things football fans chant are reasonably self explanatory and don’t really qualify as being strange (plus there seems to be a general dearth of genuinely witty new chants surfacing from the fans these days, with the odd one-off exception at away matches).  This one wouldn’t be strange, were it not for the fact that you still hear it even this season!

You are my Forest
My only Forest
You make me happy
When skies are grey
You never notice
How much I love you
So please don’t take
My Forest away

It goes to the tune of ‘you are my sunshine’ and I suppose is indicative of that unconditional love we have that leads us to torture ourselves with watching Forest week in week out.  Certainly the last few weeks, when the weather has been mild and the football’s been shite, I’d be more inclined to sing “you make be miserable, when skies are blue!”, but still - I suppose it isn’t particularly strange, but it does raise a wry smile when it goes up even during the most drab and dire performance (and let’s face it, there’s plenty to choose from this season!).

Although I quite like the section suggesting that this love is unrequieted, because that feels very much how things are at the moment whether it be the ‘powers that be’, the manage or the players - part of that is our own doing, because we’re impatient - that said, we got nearly 28,000 at the City Ground, in Division Three, despite staring down the barrel of a third season in this shit league - we may grumble a bit, but we still turn up!