Truth be told, I wasn’t really up for the Cup. Honest. I wasn’t really up for the Cup when we reached the semis last year. The Wembley “we’ve had a lovely day out” experience for the semis is all about the commercialisation of the Cup. I may have let my guard drop a little if we had reached the Final.
Yeah, yeah - that’s an easy thing to say. Especially in hindsight after watching yet another lacklustre display from Forest away at Wrexham on Friday evening. The first half Shit Show hurt even more, knowing that Forest were being exposed yet again with a live TV audience.
This was the weird prism in which I use to watch Forest in the 80’s and 90’s. I could handle a defeat I had seen in the flesh, as long as my friends from around the country at the time hadn’t seen us play poorly. I was quite the social climber back in the day, with fancy friends in far flung places such as Barking and Ilford.
But now the game has changed. Every crappy little half-arsed tackle is clipped up and put up on X, seconds after slapping my forehead back at home at how shit Forest have become this season. What a world we live in.
Which is a long-winded way of saying that I could write a highbrow tactical essay here to explain how Forest’s second string struggled in the first half at Wrexham going 2-0 down, before the big boy cavalry came on and added a little fight pulling a goal back; we were exposed and were down and out at 3-1. CHO then came to the rescue and took us to extra time and pens. Poor young Omari - although he was off the pace for most of the game.
You’ll get to read far more in-depth analysis of how fragile the fringe players at Forest are elsewhere. The Forest Focus post-match stream in particular did the usual excellent job of explaining what went wrong, and more crucially, why. tl;dr it’s all about chaos at the club and the lack of stability since the summer months.
I only half watched the game to be honest. I was double screening, with most of my attention spent BALLS DEEP in a spreadsheet, trying to work out some fiddly code that was causing my latest creation to crash. I bet that’s how Sean Dyche feels on the bus back from Wrexham. It’s a fiddly thing. One rogue mistake and you’re fucked.
From what I did see, I thought Morato started well. That didn’t last long, obvs. Bakwa looked promising - my notes say here. Both players were hooked at HT, showing my complete inability to read a game of football. I’m always from that old school that thinks 606 became unlistenable when it lost the two Danny’s and became a comedy tactical show instead. Give me fan culture, not armchair critics.
I could see that Luiz struggled to get into the game. He looks the part - a proper Rolls Royce elite player with the immaculate beard and fancy foreign swagger. Looks can often deceive.
McAtee meanwhile was AWOL throughout the entire 45 minutes he was on the pitch. wtf has happened here? The narrative over the summer was that Forest should feel honoured that he has chosen us, rather than a big payday over in Germany. I would seriously pick up the phone to Young Nigel at Mansfield and loan him out in Division One for the rest of the season.
The refereeing in the first half was also poor. It was Sunday League standard with the Luiz Hand of God goal. I was convinced this wasn’t a goal after the first half a dozen replays. I’m open now to thinking that maybe the ball hit his shoulder, and not his arm.
But that’s just papering over the many cracks in what is a very fragile Forest team. Even a win away in Wrexham wouldn’t have disguised the problems we have ahead in the PL.
I upped my own spreadsheet game in the second half. Like I said - I wasn’t up for the Cup. I followed the flow of the game, but not the detail. I was surprised we managed to take to pens. SHOUT OUT to CHO with what was a superb goal to draw us level.
I did watch the shoot out. Not Taiwo, please, NOT TAIWO was my mantra. I would have preferred to see Murillo rather than Omari step up for the all important fifth kick.
And then we come to Dyche. I didn’t listen to the interview with Sir Colin of West Bridgford late in the evening. It was way past my bedtime. I saw a brief tease online, and then caught up with the trashing of his team in the morning.
Blimey. Talk about throwing half your team under the bus. Dyche basically told his fringe players in a very public outing that they aren’t worthy of playing for Forest. BC might have got away with this back in the day, but Dyche still has a lot to learn from the Master.
This leaves us with effectively two teams, two dressing rooms. The trusted twelve or so may just get us over the relegation red line in the PL, but if anything happens to any of them then we’re in deep shit.
A Cup run would have been bloody awful. But OF COURSE you would day that. But in-between fire fighting at home in the PL, and then taking a few fancy foreign trips in the Europa League, I could well do without the likes of another Exeter midweek away day.
Stick that in your silly spreadsheet.