Firstly the good news: skipper Paul “Kenna” McKenna’s injury does not require surgery and so there is a glimmer of hope that he may return before the season ends (which would be especially useful if we end up in the dreaded play-offs).
In the meantime, the sponsorship deal with Victor Chandler has been extended by two more years (with Victor himself rather relieved that Newcastle’s form means that Forest are unlikely to win the league).
Now the bad, if not entirely unexpected news: after the scuffles at Pride Park, both Forest and Derby have been fined £45,000 by the FA (mysteriously no sanctions against Jay McEveley, who was at the centre of affairs both times). Mark Arthur is “surprised at the severity of the fine”.
So as not to end on a sour note, here is some footage of new boy Georgie Boyd strutting his stuff:
Following his stunning/lucky/wind-assisted/goalkeeper-assisted (delete as applicable) goal on Saturday, young Pole Raddy Majewski has been named in the Football League’s Team of the Week (alongside ex-Red Sammy Clingan, who scored another cracking free-kick at the weekend).
In other news, Forest have been linked with Leeds left-back Alan Sheehan, currently enjoying a renaissance in form whilst on loan to Oldham Athletic (don’t be fooled by this talk of him being a striker, that is simply shoddy journalism).
Sven favourite and Forest hate-figure David Platt has been linked with the managerial position at Notts County. Even though Charlie is still the manager. Is it April Fools’ Day already?
Finally, a real treat from one of our favourite newspapers (which Rahoul had already posted on Twitter): a rant about … well, everything to do with the management from boardroom downwards, it seems. The article attacks Messrs Pleat, Doughty, Arthur and Davies, but makes no discernible point about anything really.
There was an interesting comment from Billy Davies ahead of Wednesday night’s LittlewoodsRumbelowsCoca-Cola Carling Cup Tie against Bradford which seems to have gone under the radar:
I’ve said all along that we want to be a club that wins games of football – it doesn’t matter whether it’s the League Cup, friendly matches or bounce games. That’s the mentality we need in the club and that’s what we’re trying to do.
This reminds me of a comment that Frank Clark made when he was Forest boss, along the lines of “success breeds success”; basically, try and win every game you play, as this can only raise your confidence levels and make you more likely to keep winning.
I like this attitude. The one thing that Forest have struggled to do under the stewardship of Colin Calderwood was to maintain a winning streak (with the honourable and notable exception of the extraordinary run that eventually gained us promotion). A lack of consistency has cost the club dear over many years. Instilling a winning mentality is vital – just look at Arsenal’s “Invicibles” or Manchester United for most of the last fifteen years.
However, as usual, there is a gripe. Billy Davies has been moaning about not signing any defenders. Obviously I sense that he is making political comments for the benefit of Marthur and the transfer committee, but it seems strange that he has signed so many forwards and midfielders, and not acquired a single centre-half. It seems even more odd that apparent number-one target Rob Jones has joined Scunthorpe (can they really offer better terms than Forest?), and that Forest fan Shaun Barker has joined the woolly ones. We knew we were short in defence, how come we have let these two (and others) get away, and do we now regret letting Brendan Moloney and Joe Heath go out on loan?
The good news is that Chris Gunter should be back for tomorrow’s match against West Bromwich, along with his Welsh teammate Robbie Earnshaw. The indications are that Nathan Tyson should be fit, despite being carried off following a “robust” challenge at the end of Wednesday’s match, and that Chris Cohen (captain against Bradford) will continue at left-back.
Finally, I would like to draw your attention to a piece by the excellent Galaxy42 over on Vital Forest, in which last year’s skipper James Perch gives his blessing to the hypnotic powers of Paul McKenna as skipper, and admits that it may be Christmas before he kicks a ball again. Get well soon Perchio.
Before I start, I am not saying that Davies should be sacked or is not fit to manage this club – it is far too early to resort to such mean-spirited words…
Those of you who listened to the post-Derby podcast will have noticed that we weren’t happy, and that we were laying the blame at least partly at the manager’s door. There is much talk about the “acquisition committee”, and this has been started (at least partly) by the manager’s decision to publicly bemoan the lack of transfer activity.
We do desperately need new players, and I do agree that in an ideal world, the manager should be trusted to make the acquisitions himself. I can also understand why Messrs Doughty and Arthur are reluctant to relinquish the purse strings after poor signings made by Platt, Hart, Kinnear and Megson.
<RANT>The trouble I have with Billy Davies is that his world revolves around him, even down to referring to himself in the third person. The trouble I have is that he slags off the players in public one day, saying that they are not proud to wear the shirt, then after the Derby match states that it is not their fault as they are putting in lots of effort. He then says that he will sleep easy at night as it is not his fault, then he says that people should blame him because he is the manager. He basically states that there is little point turning up for the matches against teams in the top half of the table as we cannot compete. He, amazingly, even turns down the Megson-esque road of challenging the fans to pick a better team with the resources we have:
If there are any fans out there who can come up with a better formation, who can find the winning formula, they are welcome to come in and advise us.
Well Billy, I doubt you will read this, and I also doubt whether you would read it if I put it in an envelope and posted to you care of NFFC, but maybe you could play this team at Reading:
Smith
Moloney Morgan Chambers Heath
Cohen
Anderson McGugan McCleary
Earnshaw Tyson
See?
It’s 4-4-2, of sorts, rather than the unimpressive 5-3-2 of recent weeks.
Play a right back, rather than having a centre-half haplessly continuing out of position; you don’t have to worry about him; with the exception of one costly mistake against QPR, young Brendan has looked more than capable so far (as I write this, I wonder – is Moloney due a suspension this week? I cannot find it anywhere on the OS).
Breckin looked knackered last week, so give Luke Chambers a chance in his natural position – he has looked decent enough in the snatches that he has played there before.
Perch and Moose are out, so put our most industrious man in the heart of midfield.
Play Lewis, our most creative player, further up the pitch where he can hopefully see more of the ball and weave some magic.
Rather than complain about not having a left-winger, play a winger there!
Stop telling the defenders to hoof it up to a whippet and a terrier. Neither of them are target men, and against giant centre-halves, they are not going to get much change.
Of course, I don’t expect Ando or Earnie to last ninety minutes, so we may have to rely on the likes of Matt Thornhill and Joe Garner to come off the bench. The squad may be half-fit and short on numbers, but if you keep asking players to do stuff that they are not comfortable with, you are going to struggle to get results from them (and God knows, we saw enough of that under Calderwood). </RANT>
I do want Billy to succeed, really I do. For all the home truths that he is trying to state, I just don’t think his charm offensive has worked so far, on or off the pitch.
Posted February 19th, 2009by Rahoul Baruah4 Comments »
UPDATE: I think I’m over this now – still not sure what that interview was supposed to achieve but I’m sure Billy has a masterplan in mind. Bring on the Sheep!
The knives are out. Billy Davies, Mark Arthur, Nigel Doughty; no-one escapes the wrath of the Forest fan in the run up to yet another game against the Sheep.
And the source of this malaise?
The fact that our small, injury-ravaged League One squad is still struggling in the Championship, was not strengthened during the transfer window and the fabled new-manager effect simply has not happened (or at least was very short-lived).
Before Calderwood went I said a change (of some kind, not necessarily of manager) was needed; at the very least a big centre-half, a big centre-forward and someone to offer some leadership. Now, in February, we have a new manager but no new players. Fair play to Billy – watch him from the touchlines and he is offering the leadership. He went for Rob Jones to play at the back and Dele Adebola up-front. So it looks, on paper, like he had identified the same weaknesses as me.
But we didn’t get either and the consensus is that this is the board’s fault. Could be, I don’t know enough about what went on. Is Jones worth more than £600000 or is he another Lynch? Should anyone ever pay any money for Adebola? Were the board just tight or did they just not want to pay over the odds for players who may not be good enough to keep us up (can you tell which one of those two I feel falls into that category?) If they were tight then it’s definitely a false economy – League One will cost far more than the extra £400000 that was reportedly the difference between our valuation of Jones and Hibs’ (although I’ve also seen it written that we offered £1m for him).
However, for whatever reason, we didn’t bring anyone in during the window. So we have to make do with what we’ve got (and what we can loan in).
And this is where my problems begin. We know that they are young and inexperienced. We know that the Championship is a big step up from League One. We know that we have an injury crisis on, forcing us to play players who aren’t first choices. But that is the hand we have – unless we loan four or five players in tomorrow, then that is the hand we will have when playing Derby. We are where we are.
So why slag them off Billy? We all know that confidence is a vital component of success in football. Do you honestly believe that telling the only players you have available that they will never make it at this level is going to make them perform better this weekend?
In goal we’ve got Smith. The best thing that Calderwood did this season (apart from getting us to play some pretty football that had been sorely lacking for quite a few years) was bring in Lee Camp. Whilst some people think Campo is the second coming of Peter Shilton, I’m not so convinced. The defence needed a kick up the arse and Campo gave it to them. But in terms of actual keeping ability there’s not so much in it (Smith’s terrible kicking aside) – witness Campo’s flapping at a cross when we played against QPR.
At centre-half we’re looking OK. Breckin and Wesley are the first choice pairing; having Breckin back in the fold is a definite bonus, but Calderwood wasn’t lying when he said the old man isn’t fit enough to play every week. Wes has been immense after a dodgy start to the season. Chambers is an able deputy (note, this is centre-half) but Wilson appears to be getting worse under Davies, and he wasn’t playing great to start with.
At full-back is where the real trouble now lies. Moloney has been a breath of fresh air this season, but Davies does not appear to trust the youngster to do the job. Leaving Chambers to play at right-back and we all know it’s just not his position. Things are worse on the left with Bennett out injured – leaving Heath who tries hard but isn’t ready, Wilson, who looks like someone playing out of position (funny that) or Lynch. Nuff said.
In midfield, it’s no secret that I am a great fan of Perchio – he’s not the best defensive midfielder in the world but it’s a vital (unsung) role and he does it well. The Moose should be back soon and he had a great start to the season, but seemed to go missing for a few games before his injury. Cohen is many people’s favourite for player of the season – certainly his work-rate is incredible. Thornhill is probably my favourite of the youngsters – intelligent, beautifully timed runs with excellent passing. And then there’s Lewis McGugan. Probably our most talented player, certainly the one we could sell for the most money. But he seems to have gone backwards recently. Billy plays him a bit deeper than Colin did and he looks like he’s struggling with it – and when Lewis plays badly, Forest plays badly.
And then, up-front. Earnie’s out injured and this is a big loss, as our only Championship-quality player. Tyson works his socks off but isn’t an out-and-out goal-scorer. And he can’t do it all by himself. Leaving Garner. The target for Davies’ post-match interview and another youngster with obvious talent but not necessarily the work-rate or application Billy wants. From the little we’ve seen of him so far, he appears to be one of those who does nothing for 89 minutes then produces a piece of magic that turns the game. However, I can’t see much more magic coming from him under this manager.
We’re in the shit. We know that. The players know that. The manager knows that. The board (probably) know that. And when you’re up against it you need to be pulling together. Unity can make up for a number of deficiencies. Unfortunately, I don’t see much of that around the City Ground at the moment. Sorry to be so gloomy, but things aren’t looking good.
After the pleasing, if rather nerve-wracking victory on Tuesday (never did get a chance to write that match report – in summary, absolutely sublime pass by McCleary for Tyson’s goal, Arron Davies was frustrating, and Lewis did his now customary trick of disappearing for 70 minutes of the match – oh yeah, and the referee and linesman were poor again), the Billy Davies bubble burst with the new manager’s first defeat at the hands of Cardiff City.
By the sounds of it, we can have few complaints, although others report that the referee was far from convincing. I am not too worried by the defeat, Cardiff are in an amazing run of form (especially at home), but I, like many others, are concerned by the Reds’ lack of fit first-teamers.
This paved the way for the spotlight to fall on our hapless CEO, and it seems as though Mark Arthur is either a genius at mind games, or is trying to make excuses for yet another January of incoming transfer inactivity. This is all the more intriguing considering that the new manager has said that he would like some more bodies in the squad. Watch this space I suppose, and let’s hope that (unlike in previous years), we don’t have important players leaving (I am sure that everyone has heard whispers about Earnshaw and McGugan), whilst relying on the emergency loan market for any new faces…
Joel Lynch’s loan agreement has been extended until the end of the season (cue loud cheers from the City Ground crowd), but in slight contrast to Campo’s post-match interview, it seems as though negotiations may resume once the new manager is in place (depending upon how you read the story).
In the meantime, the Birmingham Express & Star suggest that Forest could turn to veteran Walsall keeper Clayton Ince to provide a new goalkeeping solution.
As for the managerial vacancy, Marthur says that there are “four or five candidates”, some of whom are still in employment elsewhere. However, Nigel Clough is unlikely to be one of them.
I shouldn’t comment too much on the match, because not only was I not there, but I wasn’t even able to listen to it. However, I did manage to turn on the radio after 5pm, when the victory was confirmed, and would like to comment on the following:
John Pemberton picked an unusual line-up, notably dropping Garner, Earnshaw and young Brendan Moloney (from what I have seen, the most consistent outfield player in recent weeks). This saw the surprising return of Luke Chambers at right-back; maybe Moloney had picked up a knock (he did run a bit gingerly after a tackle late on in the Donny match), or maybe Pembo did not want to play two teenagers at full-back?
Despite the fact that many Reds fans bemoaned Calderwood’s reluctance to play 4-4-2 for so long, Pembo went for a 4-5-1, with Lewis playing behind Tys, and it seems to have worked.
Ian Breckin and Joe Garner scored the fifth and sixth (I think) own goals against the Reds this season; “own goal” is still Forest’s third highest scorer so far. Has anyone heard of another 3-2 in which the same team scored all five goals?
Pemberton commented that he did not have to do much to gee up the players, and the fact that Lewis scored a determined solo effort today, after an absolute stinker of a performance on Friday, possibly illustrates this.
Sorry to end on a downer, but Lee Camp throwing his shirt into the crowd at the end, and his post-match interview, may signify a couple of things: the board do not want to step in and complete the transfer when they are about to appoint a new manager, or that Camp is playing at some amateur psychology while keeping the Forest supporters on his side. Reading between the lines, it is hard not to speculate that the club are about to appoint Billy Davies, hence Camp does not want to stay (after a public falling-out between the two at Derby).
Pembo also said that he has only been asked to take charge for one match, and I guess that means that we will have a new man by the Manchester City cup tie. Marthur took the unusual step of doing an interview with Radio Nottingham before the match, and although he wouldn’t be drawn on talk of Billy Davies, he did say that there had been offers from people currently in employment, and also said that the club were looking for someone with Championship experience (which rules out our Nigel).
