Yahoo News How telling moment against Tottenham sums up key Nottingham Forest issue in relegation battle
Nottingham Forest have been challenged to prove they have sufficient leadership in the group as they fight to retain their Premier League status.
As they go into their final six games of the season, the Reds are out of the relegation zone on goal difference. Last Tuesday’s impressive 3-1 win over Fulham was a shot in the arm for their survival hopes, but Nuno Espirito Santo’s side know they must keep that standard of performance up.
They competed well in the first half away to Tottenham Hotspur on Sunday but fell to a 3-1 defeat. They will now look to bounce back at home to Wolverhampton Wanderers on Saturday.
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However, on this week’s Garibaldi Red podcast the topic of leaders cropped up. It came after the armband swapped between several players once skipper Ryan Yates was substituted in the 81st minute against Spurs.
“When Ryan Yates got substituted, he didn't know who to give the armband to because (Morgan) Gibbs-White had already gone off. He looked at everybody, he took the armband off and he threw it up in the air,” said Reds fan Steve Bennett.
“Eventually Neco Williams picked it up. And then when Neco went off, he looked around and (Anthony) Elanga came and picked it up.
“If you're the manager of a team, you know who your leaders are. If you're the team, you know who your leaders are. How can we have a situation in game 32 of the season where Ryan Yates goes off and there's nobody actually to take that armband, as opposed to Ryan Yates chucking it up in the air? What does that tell you about the leadership within that group?
“Okay, Neco Williams picked it up. Neco Williams is 22, he's a youngster. Nicolas Dominguez was captain at Bologna. He could have had it.
“Who else was there? I mean, there was nobody really senior on the pitch at that stage. But that, again, says something, I think, about the way that we've been set up for the season. And for me, it's coming home to roost.
“Let's go back 24 hours. I’m sitting on the train going down to London and thinking, do I expect us to get anything from Spurs? My head tells me no. My heart says it would be wonderful if we can get away with a draw, great.
“But it's a no-lose situation. Spurs, if they win, they go into the Champions League spots. We are where we are. So I went to the ground, not really expecting anything other than a nice day out and the privilege of going to the Spurs ground because it was the first time I'd been there for a football match.
“But in the end, I was really, really disappointed because we could have got so much more out of it. Spurs were there for the taking, but we didn't take them. And we didn't respond to the decisions they made and were capable of making.
“The optimism is we've got a better goal difference than Luton. And if we can't get one more point than Luton in the next six games, we don't deserve to be in the league anyway. We're not out of it in the slightest, but there's got to be some more really good Fulham-type performances in the next six games.”
Victory over the Cottagers last time out at the City Ground was Forest’s second league win of the calendar year. Finding a level of consistency in the run-in is going to be crucial.
“We just shouldn’t be in this position,” Bennett added. “We've got 11, 14, probably 18 good players who ought to by now be a really good team. We're much better than where we currently sit.
“Yes, there's a four-point deduction in there, but we're much better than where we currently sit. But the sum of the parts somehow isn't. For me, that comes back to the leadership of that group.
“We've lost something. Think of the way Ange Postecoglo speaks and talks. Think of the way Jurgen Klopp speaks and talks. I'm not drawing that sort of comparison, but we had something really special under Steve Cooper.
“Something had to change, but there was that unity. And I just don't see that there is that unity, there isn't that leadership. There isn't something for us all to go, we can all gather around and believe in that individual and that person's going to get us out of this mess. That person at the moment is probably Morgan Gibbs-White, but to put that amount of pressure on a single player is really daunting.”
Forest reporter Sarah Clapson added: “That leadership is so important, not just on the pitch, but off it as well, in the dressing room. It's having a group of players that know how to see out those moments, who can get everybody going, can keep calm, cool heads when you need it and can give that little bit of something extra.
“Forest do have some of those players. Yates is one. Gibbs-White is one. Willy Boly, although he has obviously been injured. Matz Sels probably comes into that as well now, albeit he only arrived in January.”
