{"id":4575,"date":"2022-01-08T15:15:43","date_gmt":"2022-01-08T15:15:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=4575"},"modified":"2022-01-10T20:15:01","modified_gmt":"2022-01-10T20:15:01","slug":"no-cold-feet-in-nottingham","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/?p=4575","title":{"rendered":"No Cold Feet In Nottingham"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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From Arsenal.com<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

And so to the City Ground, Nottingham, for the third round of the FA Cup on the feast day of St Basilissa, whom the devout invoke against chilblains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Moving on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For two teams that have played each other 100 times and first met in 1904, it is odd that the four encounters in the FA Cup have all been since 1979. Honours are even, two wins apiece. The sequence is: won (1979, when we went on to win the Cup), lost (1988), won (1993, when we went on to win the Cup), lost (2018, our first third-round defeat since 1996). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here’s hoping the sequence holds \u2014 all the way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nottingham Forest first won the FA Cup in 1898, beating perennial East Midlands rival Derby County, 3-1. We had lost to Burnley in the first round after winning three qualifying ties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have gone on to win the FA Cup 14 times, but Forest has done so just once more, the 2-1 win over Luton Town in 1959. Elton John’s cousin, Roy Dwight, scored Forest’s opening goal but was later stretchered off after breaking his shinbone in a tackle that would end his career.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Forest’s only other appearance in an FA Cup final was in 1991 during the last knockings of the Clough years. They had the ill-grace to lose to the neighbours, 2-1.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Peak Clough had brought two European Cups, a league title, and two league cups. Cloughie would win two more league cups after his break-up with Peter Taylor, but 1991 was his only FA Cup final as player or manager.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Clough era ended with Forest’s relegation at the end of the inaugural season of the Premiership. The club bobbed back and forth until being relegated for a third and, to date, last time in 1999. Forest has plied its trade in the Championship since save for a brief spell in the third tier in the mid-naughties. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Opposition<\/strong>
Forest started this season even more disastrously than we did: one point from their first seven league games. Manager Chris Houghton was sacked in September. His replacement, former Swansea City and England youth teams coach, Steve Cooper, has transformed the club’s fortunes. Only one of the next 16 games up to Christmas was lost, taking the team from bottom to within hailing distance of the playoff spots. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two narrow defeats in the two games since Boxing Day have not diminished belief at the City Ground that an exciting young team is coming together that is good enough to get back to the Premiership. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cooper got Swansea to the playoffs in both his seasons in Abertawe and is strengthening his Forest squad for a second-half push. Aston Villa’s promising young striker Keinan Davis has come in on loan to reinforce the firepower upfront. Centre-half Steve Cook has been bought from Bournemouth to provide playoffs experience to the defence alongside ever-presents Joe Worrall and Scott McKenna. Richie Laryea, a pacy, feisty Canada international who can play full-back and wingback, is on the way from Toronto in the MLS.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cooper switches up his formations but tends to play 5-4-1 or 3-4-1-2 against stronger teams. However it lines up, his team will be tactically disciplined and well structured. Like most young coaches (he is 42), Cooper wants his team to control games through possession and pressing. Forest will be physical in doing so and in driving into the half-spaces and getting men in behind. Think Graham Potter’s Brighton.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Much-travelled striker Lewis Grabban (Forest is his 12th club) and Nottingham-born, 20-year-old Wales international midfielder Brennan Johnson are the danger men. Grabban has ten goals and four assists, while Johnson, who is attracting attention from mid-level Premier League clubs, has five with four assists. Philip Zinckernagel, a Danish winger on loan from Watford, is also among the goals with four, plus four assists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last Monday, Forest’s scheduled league game against Barnsley was called off because of a lengthy list of injuries and Covid infections in the Forest camp. Most missed of half a dozen injury absentees on Sunday will be first-choice left wingback Max Lowe. He and Middlesborough loanee Djed Spence on the opposite flank are the heartbeats of Cooper’s system. Former Newcastle DM Jack Colback’s switch out wide to cover Lowe’s absence has been detrimental to central stability.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our very own Jordi Osei-Tutu’s season long-loan at the City Ground has been cut short, following another long-term injury for the young right-back, but he would have been ineligible to play against his parent club. We are also unlikely to see Karl Jenkinson, formerly of this parish. The Corporal is on Forest’s books but has played only four minutes since October 2020 and is deemed surplus to requirements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Arsenal<\/strong>
We shall have an unfamiliar look. The team will play in an all-white strip in support of the No More Red campaign to keep young people safe from knife crime and youth violence. Full marks to the club.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The eleven itself will be more familiar. The postponement of Thursday’s first leg of the Carabao Cup semi-final against Liverpool eases the rotation dilemma for Arteta, as does a depleted squad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We know our AFCON contingent — Partey, Elneny, Pepe, Auba and Rekik — will be unavailable. Gabriel is suspended. Kolasinac is back in training but nowhere near match ready (no change there). Chambers may not be back from Covid, but Nketiah is. According to Arteta, ESR is carrying an injury that limits him to appearances off the bench, and he may not even make it that far on Sunday. Maitland-Niles will be in Rome. That will open space in the matchday squad for Charlie Patino and Salah-Eddine Oulad M’Hand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Assuming that the pre-game round of Covid testing does not upset selection at the last minute, I am guessing that unforced rotation will be limited to starts for Leno in goal and the Carabao Cup Player of the quarter-final round, Nketiah. Patino might conceivably start, but it would be a gutsy call for what will be a tough match.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leno<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tomiyasu, White, Holding, Tierney<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lokonga, Xhaka<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Saka, \u00d8degaard, Martinelli<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nketiah<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bench: Ramsdale, Soares, Mari, Tavares, Patino, ESR, Balogun, Lacazette, Salah-Eddine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Special FA Cup rules for this season: clubs can use up to five of nine named substitutes, and there will be no replays in the third and fourth rounds. If scores are level after 90 minutes, it is 30 minutes of extra time, then a penalty shootout if required.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The ‘holics pound<\/strong>
The bookies have us as short-odds favourites. Yet, this will not be an easy game against a team that could be in the Premiership next season. A 2-0 win seems realistic, but there is not much value to be had unless we score three or more goals; 3-0 and 3-1 are available at fourteens. If you fancy that we can score four, you can find odds in the thirties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let’s hotfoot it into the next round.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Enjoy the game, ‘holics near and far.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

And so to the City Ground, Nottingham, for the third round of the FA Cup on the feast day of St Basilissa, whom the devout invoke against chilblains. Moving on. For two teams that have played each other 100 times and first met in 1904, it is odd that the four encounters in the FA […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4575"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4575"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4575\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4582,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4575\/revisions\/4582"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4575"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4575"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goonerholicsforever.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4575"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}