A Last Minute Equaliser, But We Got Away With Nothing

On a day when all in garibaldi visiting the City Ground entered the turnstile with renewed optimism, the greatest credit for the day must be that nobody, not players, fans or management allowed that optimism to fade as decision after decision went against us. The more it seemed the footballing Gods were against us you could have forgiven everyone for accepting it wasn't our day & allowing the final 10 or 20 minutes of the game to slowly ebb away.Memories of our visit to the AmEx Stadium came to mind where we huffed & puffed for 90 minutes & fell to a final round sucker punch & even as early as Reid hitting the post in the first half hour it had 'that feel' about it.

 

As time pushed on, as it is legally obliged to do, it started to look more and more like a day to forget. The referee chose to avoid the 'hand ball' rule as Brighton used that particular appendage to control or challenge for the ball time & time again only for the assistant to draw the referees attention to this particular infringement the very first time Forest were guilty of it.

 

Then we saw Chris Gunter charged into & forced off the field of play only for the ref to adjudge this one a 'shoulder to shoulder' challenge and only minutes later we saw Guedioura punished for a less physical challenge & it became abundantly clear that what we had here was a fresh faced inexperienced referee that didn't want to be considered a homer & simply overcompensated. All but the most obvious of Brighton infringements would go unpunished. It was, to use the popular phrase, just going to be one of those days.

 

Poor free kick to give away, Vokes poorly marked, a decent delivery by Vicente & there it is. Brighton lead 1 nil with their only meaningful chance of the game. Bugger!

 

From here on in, it just got silly, McCleary had a shot pushed wide, Guedioura hit the post, Miller hit the post, the Brighton midfield got away with blatant thuggery & Mr Naylor the ref, well, he just kept on getting things wrong. That optimistic vibe that the day started with though, in a break from City Ground tradition, continued unabated. There were no, or very few, groans from the crowd & the only negativity was directed at Mr Naylor & the players, egged on by the sheer force of will emanating from both Guedioura & Reid dragged us kicking & screaming to a pivotal moment, one of those moments that tends to get missed & forgotten in the mists of time.

 

With 20 minutes to go, Greg Cunningham was fouled, It didn't look particularly nasty, certainly nothing compared to the viciousness the Geddy had had to put up with, & after booking Matthew Sparrow for it, Andy Reid became apoplectic at the referee, pointing out some abrasion on Cunningham's face, letting the referee know in no uncertain terms that Sparrow should be off the field & as young Greg got extended on field treatment, Reidy wouldn't let it go, constantly on at the ref, gesticulating towards Sparrow until the ref was left under no illusion, he'd made a massive error & from that point on, every decision that was needed was going to go our way, quite why our players weren't throwing themselves to the ground in the penalty area I have no idea, some sense of fair play I assume that to me seemed unrelated with this particular match.

 

And when the game entered it's closing stages, when the stadium would usually start emptying, the fans stuck with the team & roared them on, the players believed in themselves & kept pushing forward & in those final few seconds it happened, the ball was thrown in, Dexter Blackstock somehow managed to move the ball on & Lynch smashed it in.

 

So there it was, a game we had dominated from start to finish & a game where the officials had chosen to apply the rules differently depending on the regularity with which you play in that particular stadium and I'm left feeling that we'd been cheated by those entrusted to govern the game & deserted by lady luck.

 

When you walk away from a game having scored late on & take something from the game you usually feel like you've 'gotten away with it' but not in this game. Make no mistake, this was a fine Nottingham Forest performance, one I sincerely hope doesn't come back to haunt us at the end of April.

Game Stats v Brighton

Shots: Forest 13 - 3 Brighton

On target: Forest 5 - 2 Brighton
Corners: Forest 8 - 0 Brighton

Fouls: Forest 9 - 13 Brighton

Combined Season Stats v Brighton

Shots: Forest 24 - 5 Brighton

On target: Forest 7 - 3 Brighton
Corners: Forest 16 - 5 Brighton
Fouls: Forest 21 - 21 Brighton