Nottingham Forest – 2
Brentford -1
Forest progress to the regional quarter finals tonight in the dress rehearsal of the league fixture we have to look forward to on saturday. In front of an eerily empty City Ground, Forest started the game positively, starting with Pedersen in net, youngster Vincent Fernandez as the rightmost centreback in a back three along with Captain Wes and Julian Bennett, with a midfield four of Curtis, Perch, Clingan and Southall, and an attacking trio of Grant Holt and Jack Lester just behind Junior Agogo.
For all Forests’ early possession and passing, and for all the evident haplessness of Brentford, we never really looked all that decisive in the first half. Brentford were quite happy to allow us time and space in the centre but we didn’t seem to find a means of progressing beyond this. However it was somewhat against the run of play that they took the lead. Fernandez – who had impressed up to now – was utterly stitched up by a clever turn and nutmeg by Kuffour, his subsequent shot deflected off Wes Morgan and into the net – which the official site credits as an own goal. Jack picked up a booking for a reckless lunge just before the break – it looked like he got the ball to me, but I’m not sure he was going for it!
So half time came giving the 75 plucky Brentford fans nestled in the Bridgford End something to cheer at, the predictable boos came from the remaining 1956 Forest fans in the Main Stand. It’s been a while since I’ve ventured into D block – my god, what a bunch of whingers! It’s more like sitting in the house of commons than at a football match, I half expected people to start shouting ‘rhubarb! rhubarb!’
The second half started much as the first did, but fortunately for us we used our possession much more usefully than prior to the break. It only took a couple of minutes for the lively Agogo to pick up the ball on the left after dinking inside a couple of defenders, sending a delicious ball for ‘goal machine’ Southall to plant home first time much to the relief of the crowd! Ten minutes or so later it was again Agogo the provider as he placed a ball into the box for Grant Holt to head beyond the keeper – it looked like an easy save to me, but somehow it squeezed its way in.
Agogo was looking very confident now, with a few tricks and runs – Calderwood was obviously pleased enough with his contribution to not risk him further, shortly after he teed Southall up with another chance he was substituted for Commons, to a standing ovation from the now appreciative fans. Five minutes later and more youngsters were introduced into midfield, Robert Hughes for Sammy Clingan, and Lewis McGugan for Nicky Southall. Ultimately that was pretty much it – the game wasn’t exciting, or particularly good – but we did a job, and hopefully it will prove helpful in overcoming the same opponents (well, ish) on saturday!
Filed under: Matches | Comments Off on Junior spares Hallowe’en horror show..
Judge: David Platt, you have been charged with the serious crime of impersonating a competent football manager – of flagrantly wasting millions of pounds on poor quality signings, and giving them over-inflated contracts which served to plunge the club into barely controllable debt, and ultimately the irreparably embarrassing and costly slide into League One. How do you plead?
Before now I had quite serious reservations about the moral implication of cloning human beings, after all, it’s playing God – it’s unnatural, all those things – it’s not a comfortable subject with me. However, the impact a certain Mr Daniel Cullip has on the Nottingham Forest defence has convinced me of the virtues of bending this rule a little, in fact, I’m prepared to completely disregard it and just go for it./slides/Yeading%209%20Jan%20(A).jpg)
A couple of FA Cup related bits of news popped up today – firstly, and thankfully, we have NOT been picked to be televised for this fixture (probably a good job, as the ever-optimistic Forest powers-that-be have opted to not open the Brian Clough stand for the game – so it would look amusing on TV with no fans visible from most camera angles!). The BBC have decided to show Weymouth vs Bury, and Sky have opted for Macclesfield vs Walsall – odd choices, but I’m not grumbling so long as they’re far far far away from the City Ground, filming some other team undergoing some kind of abject humiliation.
Evergreen Nicky Southall has spoken today of wanting to continue his recent goalscoring exploits, which has seen him net 4 goals in our last three games, gaining us 9 points into the bargain, keeping us in our lofty eyrie atop League One. He believes this to be the most prolific spell in his career, and certainly a chance to continue against ailing Brentford on saturday in the league will be a tempting prospect – even if he doesn’t feature against them in the cup tomorrow. He said:
This game will be played infront of the fewest number of fans seen at the City Ground for some time, but those of us canny enough to realise it will save us from an evening of being terrorised by trick or treaters can at least hope for an interesting diversion this Hallowe’en. With only the Main Stand open for home supporters, Forest are clearly fearing the worst in terms of how many people will show up – and who can blame them, with an exhorbitant £15 price tag on tickets! 
The news of us drawing Yeading at home has sent a shockwave amongst Forest fans, well okay, a tedium tremor? Okay, an increasing sense of boring inevitability? A few folks might remember Yeading played Newcastle in the FA Cup the season before last, and managed to not concede a goal for 51 minutes – in the end, obviously, they did – and lost 2-0 thanks to goals from Shola Ameobi and Lee Bowyer, but you get the general drift – this is, as a pundit would say, the potential banana skin.
Perpetually overlooked Kevin James has been offloaded to Grimsby Town on a three month loan deal today – which is probably good news for all concerned. The pacey winger has never really shown any inclination or ability to force his way into first team reckoning, so really this could be a beneficial move all round – for us, we get rid of him for a bit, Kevin gets some first team football, and the League Two strugglers hopefully get someone capable of performing at that level.
