Nottingham Forest: A love that never dies
At the age of 6 I was taken to the City Ground for the first time by my Dad and my Grandad, deeply ingrained in my memory are various memories of visiting the stadium for the first number of times and watching Forest play. The walk over Trent bridge, the old digital scoreboards that used to flash when Forest scored and the feeling of celebrating a goal. Nothing compares to the thrill and the excitement of going to see your team play as a child. Unfortunately, during those formative years and as I got a bit older Forest were not very good, spending three consecutive years in League One just as I was just beginning to understand how the football league structure works.
Forest did eventually get promoted to the Championship in 2009. As a 12 year old at the time, being at the City Ground that day to see the club achieve something felt like we’d just won the Premier League. To my Dad and my Grandad who had seen Forest compete well at the very top level of English football, although it was a relief, the reality of the situation was that a club of our size should never really have had to spend 3 years wasting away in the third tier. The previous season saw us infamously lose 5-2 against Yeovil in the play-offs after being 3-1 up on aggregate after 47 minutes, a game I still remember to this day watching on the TV, heartbroken.
The Peter Taylor stand
That wasn’t the last time Forest would break my heart either. A championship play-off semi final loss against Blackpool in 2010, and another against Swansea in 2011. Missing out on the play-offs on the final day of the season against Leicester in 2013 thanks to a last minute Knockaert goal, and most recently, missing out on the play-offs on the final day despite being 3 points clear and 6 goals better off than Swansea going into the game against Stoke in 2020. From all of those years of following Forest seeing us fall time and time again, it felt like we were cursed. Forest fans would have been forgiven for giving up hope of ever returning to English footballs top flight.
Despite all the disappointment, the love between the Forest fans and the club never died. The City Ground is a magical place to watch football, as Steve Cooper was quoted saying the place ‘oozes football soul’. Thanks to Cooper and the class of 22’, Forest did the unthinkable and finally after 23 years of exile, won promotion via the play-offs back to the Premier League. The feeling of being there to see us beat Sheffield United on penalties and then at Wembley beating Huddersfield in the final was pure ecstasy, joy, relief, a combination of everything. For me, it was the dream that I had been waiting on since those early years when I first started following the club.
Walking by the Trent
Since the promotion, we’ve had highs of beating Liverpool and Arsenal at the City Ground, and lows of being thrashed at the Etihad and the London Stadium in our first season. As expected, we were in a relegation scrap for our first two seasons in the Premier League and ultimately we fought well enough to survive on both occasions. The hope is that this season will represent a notable improvement which will see us transition from a bottom 6 side, to a side whose fans can relax a little bit and finish somewhere in mid-table. We’ve started the season well, if you’d said to any Forest fan in September 2021 after a defeat at home to Middlesbrough under Chris Hughton left us rock bottom of the Championship, that 3 years later we would have just beaten Liverpool 1-0 at Anfield to go 4th in the Premier League, they would have referred you to a therapist.
The second Forest game that I’ve been to this season came yesterday as Forest took on Fulham at the City Ground. The game itself wasn’t a classic to say the least, Forest were without our magic man Morgan Gibbs-White and that really showed. A positive trend that we have seen this season so far has been how well drilled we look in defence and that trend continued in the first half. It seemed that the game plan from Nuno, without Gibbs-White, was to stay solid and try and win ugly. In hindsight, Nuno may reconsider that game plan as Fulham scored the only goal of the game from the penalty spot just after half time when Murillo stood on Andreas Pereira’s ankle inside the area. One positive of watching Forest in the championship for all those years was the lack of VAR, and this was one that although was probably the right decision, inside the stadium felt frustrating. Being left in the lurch having to wait for the decision and the inevitability once the referee gets sent over to the monitor just feels unnatural and against what football should be about. Also, VAR decisions always seem to go against us. The lack of consistency is the most frustrating part.
The Trent End
Despite the 1-0 defeat, the general feeling leaving the ground was that it was a frustrating 90 minutes of football but looking at the bigger picture, it was fairly easy to stomach after Nuno has so far guided us to a strong start to the season. After the Tottenham vs Manchester United game finishes as I’m writing this, the lowest position we can find ourselves in would be 10th. You can’t really complain at that. This time last season after game week 6 we had 7 points, so currently with 9 points that shows an improvement by 2 points.
The home form is a slight concern however, having not won in any of our 3 home games this season. As mentioned before, the City Ground can be a special place to watch football. The unity, sense of belonging and electricity is created and emphasised when Forest play well at home, especially in those big games. I’m sure that over the course of this season we will experience the City Ground at it’s magical best, Nuno just has to get the balance right between wanting to have security and going for the kill.
Through the turnstiles
Merchandise stand
Our best performances this season so far have been away from home. Following Forest away from home is an unbelievable experience, I travelled all over the country when we were in the Championship, Derby away in 2015 where Ben Osborn scored a last minute winner is one that I will never forget. Other great away wins I’ve seen include a 3-1 win at Brighton in 2013, a 1-0 win away at Middlesbrough in 2016 and in that special 2021/22 promotion season; a 1-0 win away at Millwall and a crucial 1-0 win at Fulham near the end of the season. Some of those memories are of pure unadulterated chaos seeing us score winning goals away from home and being right in and amongst it. Unfortunately, since getting promoted to the Premier League I haven’t been able to get any away tickets which is a shame, but hopefully I will be able to get to one eventually, by hook or by crook.
Nottingham and Union Rowing Club
A view from the Brian Clough stand
However this season unfolds, one thing is for certain. The love between Forest fans like myself and our historic football club will never die. I think that this journey we’ve been on as fans has made us stronger, more resilient and ready for whatever comes. I just hope that we will always remember where we came from, throughout our history we’ve had moments of huge success, miracles even. We’ve also had many years of stagnation and hurt. At the minute, things look generally on the up but we know how quickly football can change. We need to cherish these moments while we can. I will be at the Crystal Palace game later in October and look forward to hopefully seeing us get our first home win of the season.
Written by Joe Horne
