Away

6

0

Howe Street mowed down.

This game took a long time to come to life as both teams struggled with the surface. Forest, spoilt by the surface at Barleylands, struggled the most as the long grass and weeds slowed their passing game almost to walking pace. Asa Dengel in the opening minutes was set free by a good pass from the midfield but was tackled not by a Howe Street defender but by a large clump of long grass. This led to the opening minutes being very disjointed and the ball spending far too long in the air for Forest to make any meaningful chances. Even so, it was obvious from the opening salvos that Forest had the better technical ability. The only problem, as with all of the games so far this season, was that Forest’s work rate was low and this kept Howe Street in the game.

This was the first time Forest had led in a game all season and could and should have been the catalyst for a strong half. However Forest failed to lift their game and this led to Howe Street keeping hope that they could still get a result out of the game. Forest did go close when after a scrappy move the ball fell to Grant Cumming on the penalty spot. His right footed shot went fizzing past the top right hand corner of the goal.

Then Howe Street came very close to equalising when some indecisive Forest defending let the Howe Street right winger have a shot at goal which was cleared over the bar by Alex Chapman.

It wasn’t all Forest however and Elliott was called into action again when Baddow played a ball over the top of the Forest defence. With the Baddow striker bearing down on his goal, Elliott stood tall and big and when the shot came, he deflected it wide for a corner.

Forest struggled on the surface to create any meaningful chances but Tom Bailey did have a powerful strike on goal from 30 yards which had everyone including the keeper thinking it was in, but it just went past the left post.

Some hard talking at half time to the Forest players highlighted the first half flaws. The team was not pressurising the Howe Street players and were allowing the easy pass too often. Forest, in the first half, also often tried to play the difficult pass when the simple game would have worked better especially on the poor pitch. Communication was also lacking with the team far too quiet.

Straight away in the second half the Forest players set about correcting the flaws from the first. Some good pressure on the Howe Street left full back resulted in a Forest throw deep into the Howe Street half. Nathan Clarke took the throw towards Jack Douglas on the edge of the area. He let the ball run across him and then Tom Barley demanded that Jack leave the ball. Tom’s shot was slightly scuffed but was met at the far post by Conor again to easily tap home his and Forest’s second goal.

Forest’s confidence grew and they began to play the kind of football that all the supporters and management know they are capable of. On the 45^th minute a sweeping move from front to back down the Forest right saw Alan Pratt play a one-two with Nathan Clarke which saw Nathan away from the Howe Street defence. Again the slow pitch allowed the Howe Street defender to get back but Nathan skilfully stepped inside the defender at the byeline. He then crossed perfectly to an unmarked Grant Cumming in the centre of the goal who powerfully headed into the corner of the net. It was a superb goal that epitomised everything that the team can do well and the Howe Street players had no chance to defend this kind of play.

Forest were now on top and on the 49^th minute Tom Barley had another superb strike at goal that just went wide after being simply set-up by his team mates.  

3-0 up Forest were now cruising and for once the luck was also beginning to go their way. The fourth goal came from a bad corner from Jack Hawthorn that was deflected into his own goal by a Howe Street defender at the near post.

Just 2 minutes later Forest again were pressurising the Howe Street defenders and Tom Barley won the ball 30 yards out. This time he didn’t strike the ball as cleanly as before and the ball looped up into air but beat the keeper at the far post. A slightly fortuitous goal but probably deserved after the earlier strikes had just missed.

The Forest domination was antagonising and frustrating the Howe Street players and they began to lose their composure. To their continual credit the Forest players did not react even when the provocation was severe.

With 10 minutes to go Nathan was again set free down the right wing. This time he cut into the goal area and in front of the Howe Street defender. In desperation the Howe Street player tried to get back closer to Nathan but ended up bundling Nathan over from behind and the referee had no alternative but point to the spot for a penalty. Jack Hawthorn took the spot kick and although it was not his best strike the keeper was now totally disillusioned and easily beaten.

At 6-0 the game was totally finished apart from Forest’s desire to keep a clean sheet. The defence had had a mainly very strong game, after some occasional lapses in concentration in the first half. The strength of the defence in this game came from a very dominant goalkeeping performance from Elliott Thwaites. His concentration this week was superb and he gave the defence the confidence to use him as a sweeper on a short pitch. He continually commanded his goal area with clear and loud calls. This is therefore an odd situation where a team wins 6-0, defends so well that the opposition has few meaningful strikes on goal, and the goalkeeper is awarded the Man-of-the-match award. In this case it is wholly justified.