Marinakis fist-pumps, Nuno dancing - a Nottingham Forest win that makes huge Champions League statement
Decisive? Maybe. Season-defining? Potentially. Either way, Nottingham Forest mic-dropped a huge statement at the City Ground on Saturday afternoon.
Write them off at your peril. Dismiss their Champions League chances at your own risk. As match-winner Callum Hudson-Odoi posted on social media after Saturday’s 1-0 triumph over Manchester City, the Reds “are not here to joke”.
They know the job is far from done. But come the end of May, Forest may well look back on this past week-and-a-half as being pivotal. Four points taken from testing games against Arsenal and the reigning champions on the banks of the Trent and an FA Cup quarter-final booked.
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Some had mooted whether this would be the weekend the Reds’ top-four challenge came under threat. Defeat for Nuno Espirito Santo’s side and a win for Chelsea over Leicester City today (Sunday) would have seen them drop down the table slightly. Instead, Forest wrote their own script... and now all that is left for them to do is pen the ending.
The final whistle on Saturday was met with an eruption of noise. Owner Evangelos Marinakis punched the air and clenched his fists in celebration before he made his way down to the tunnel to greet the players when they came off the pitch.
The Reds moved four points ahead of City and showed they mean business. Forest writer Sarah Clapson debates the big talking points from the game...
Thou shall not pass
Only a few weeks ago, there was concern that Forest’s previously watertight defence had suddenly started leaking goals. Eleven shipped in the space of three away games in the league (at Bournemouth, Fulham and Newcastle United) was out of character for Nuno’s well-drilled back line.
Fair to say normal service has now been resumed. The Gunners drew a blank in a 0-0 draw last week and City fared no better on this occasion.
Shut-outs have been the Reds’ stock in trade this term. Goalkeeper Matz Sels now has 12 of them. Only in the 1994/95 campaign, when they clinched a place in the UEFA Cup courtesy of 13 clean-sheets, have Forest registered more in a single season.
“The basic pillar for us is a clean-sheet. We are proud of achieving clean-sheets,” Nuno said afterwards.
It said a great deal about the efforts of those in front of him that Sels was rarely called into action by the champions. He could have had his deckchair out and soaked up the glorious March sunshine for the most part as just three of the visitors’ 14 shots were on target.
Full-backs Neco Williams and Ola Aina were outstanding. Murillo showed why he is fully deserving of his second Brazil call-up. And Nikola Milenkovic demonstrated why he has been integral to Forest’s progression this term. It helped, too, that the midfield offered an extra layer of protection.
Magic moment
After all the build-up, what with this being third against fourth, it was not a classic encounter Trentside. For long spells it was like a chess match; tentative and cagey. Hardly surprising given there was so much at stake.
It needed somebody to come up with something special. And special is the speciality of Morgan Gibbs-White and Hudson-Odoi.
Gibbs-White set up his teammate with an exquisite crossfield pass in the 83rd minute. Hudson-Odoi had gone close to breaking the deadlock prior to that with a trademark shot which Ederson tipped on to a post. He got the better of the City goalkeeper this time, though.
"Every time I tell him, just look for me, look for me, look for me,” the winger said of Gibbs-White in an interview with TNT Sports. “He found me. He's a special player.”
Hudson-Odoi is, too. And he continues to prove Forest snapped him up for an absolute steal from Chelsea for an initial £3 million. That was his fifth goal of the campaign, having also scored the winner in that memorable 1-0 victory away to Liverpool back in September.
Gibbs-White will surely be included when Thomas Tuchel names his first England squad next week. Hudson-Odoi must be in with a chance as well; if not this time, then at some point soon. Likewise Elliot Anderson.
Dominant Dominguez
Midfield is the one area of the team where there is something of a dilemma over who should play. It is Anderson plus A. N. Other, with plenty of debate over who should partner the former Newcastle United man.
Nicolas Dominguez hasn’t exactly been in the best of form of late, and there was an argument for Ryan Yates to have got the nod to start after some excellent displays. But the Argentine more than justified Nuno’s decision.
The Reds boss went with the same starting XI from the stalemate with Arsenal. Continuity in team selection has served Forest well this term, so it might be a case of same again for the trip to Ipswich Town next Saturday.
For the best part of 70 minutes, before he was substituted, Dominguez was outstanding and never stopped running. According to stats experts Opta, he made twice as many tackles as any other player (eight) during his time on the pitch. Only Nico Williams (10 against Tottenham Hotspur in December 2023) has ever made more tackles for the Reds in a Premier League game on record. His display answered any doubts over Dominguez’s place in the team. Now the challenge is to keep that up.
Race for the Champions League
Nuno played down the magnitude of Forest’s win - the club’s first over City in the league since 1997 - arguing it was not a “landmark” result but was a “landmark of improvement”. It is hard to get away from the significance of it, though.
The last time the Reds beat a reigning Premier League champion was in December 1994, when they toppled Manchester United. Last season, Forest finished 59 points behind City in the table. Now they are four ahead of them with 10 games to go. These special moments keep racking up.
No wonder the dressing room saw “crazy” scenes afterwards, as Hudson-Odoi put it. Nuno was caught on video dancing with Willy Boly, and even a doping control official joined in the merriment at one point.
Europe is tantalisingly close for the Reds. A banner at the front of the Trent End in Forza Garibaldi’s pre-match display read: “Our time has come again. We’ll give it everything.”
It really has been Fortress City Ground for Nuno’s men this season. They have not lost on home turf since being beaten by Newcastle in November. "We believe in them and they believe in us,” Hudson-Odoi told TNT Sports as he summed up the home support.
Every time questions have been asked about Forest this season, they have answered them. They were winless in three league games prior to Saturday and were seemingly suffering a bit of a wobble. But this team has limitless reserves of resilience and character, not to mention bags of quality. The European dream is very much on.
