Nottingham Forest 1 Watford 3 (15/04/2015)

1- A professional in the field – and not a football fan – once told me that attending a football match is one of the most “mindful” things you can do.  “Mindfulness”, in this sense, denoting the focusing of one’s attentions entirely on something real and current – something you can feel, see, hear, thus not allowing space for stressing about stuff.  This is supposed to be healthy, a Good Thing, and I don’t doubt that football serves and has served that purpose for many.

Any broader suggestion that watching football is good for your mental health might not have found great support in the aftermath of this victory, however.  Once the boisterous celebration, exploding with relief at Almen Abdi’s late third goal and extending for many minutes after the final whistle, had died down all that was left was a sort of human detritus, a zombie band of 2000-odd Hornets  drawn and battered by the events of the previous two hours on top of the days, weeks and games that preceded them.  Elated, certainly.  Back slapping and grinning in the concourse.  But always with a slightly unhinged look in the eyes.  Much talk about which of the four clubs will hold their nerve, who will be the first to blink when none shows a sign of blinking.  Forget the players, I wonder if the Canaries, Boro and Cherries fans are going through this glorious torment too?

2- Fortune had shone on us as we arrived in Nottingham.  The small private car park where we’d stopped a year ago was empty with its barrier up on the first pass but having done a loop we saw the proprietor opening up in time to duck in, less than an Heurelho Gomes throw from the away end and in plenty of time to beat what was soon to be an epic queue outside the Bridgford Fish Bar that would have made Fry Days’ equivalent look tame and half-hearted.

Luck played its part on the pitch, too, but only up to a point.  There’s nothing lucky about a clinical forward line, as we’ve discussed several times recently.  Nothing lucky about taking your chances.  Nothing lucky, either, about having a goalkeeper who has quietly – as quietly as a gregarious goateed Brazilian is capable of doing anything quietly – developed from being an athletic but excitable custodian to being a cornerstone of the side’s success, a leader and a daunting opponent.  He earned his corn this evening, as he has done more often than not recently… the first of what was to develop into a formidable string of vital and non-trivial stops came in the opening exchanges when Chris Burke found himself in space on the right of the area with the ball at his feet.  He should have scored, and would have done but for the massive keeper who hurled himself into Burke’s shooting window blocking out the light and deflecting the shot wide for good measure.

No luck there.  The luck, perhaps, was in our ability to engineer an opportunity to take the lead so quickly, before the anxiety inflated by that early exchange had a chance to fester.  As it transpired I completely missed it… from the back row of the lower tier of the Bridgford Stand at the far end of the pitch I had a pillar box view anyway, but Almen Abdi’s early corner coincided with the emergence of a group of Hornets emerging from behind the back row of seats which they’d attempted to use as a thoroughfare… I saw Ighalo reeling away as the away end, underneath a low roof, exploded.

3- Beyond that, I would contest, luck played little part.  The Hornets had the better of the half on balance but it was never anything other than an end-to-end battle in which both sides had plenty of both possession and opportunity.  For the Hornets, Cathcart headed over, Abdi was played clean  through but prodded wide, Guedioura drove over.  At the other end Gomes was forced into two or three sprawling saves, typically shots from distance  but struck with accuracy and purpose and through legs.  Buoyed by their advantage the away end was relentless, and just as nervous gaps started to wedge themselves between songs we went further ahead.

And what a fine thing it was.  Defensively we’re still making up our minds about Matt Connolly… he’s a big brute of a defender such as we’ve needed for a while, but has been caught once or twice more than you’d like, even allowing for settling in rustiness.  This goal, however, was a thing of chest-thumping magnificence…  he surged into an interception to snuff out a ball to Akpom on the edge of our box and didn’t break stride, charging comfortably half the length of the pitch in front of scattering opponents who too slowly realised that they ought to be closing him down rather than covering passing options,  before he fed Ighalo.  In truth his pass was slightly overhit, Ighalo made light of the issue and battered the ball goalwards.  Connolly, who had slowed up but not stopped moving, was there to pick up the pieces and provoked comparisons with Moses parting the Red Sea and “what rugby would be like if it wasn’t crap” in half time reflections.

4- At two-up it really should have been about quite how much we might win by.  Clear water between ourselves and a Forest side with nothing to play for, what can we do to our goal difference?  But hereby the inherent flimsiness in the assumption that games against such opponents at this stage will be easy that might be worth bearing in mind in terms of what may or may not or “will definitely” happen over the next few weeks.  Forest were reduced to ten men early in the second half, a skirmish that from our distant and very limited view could plausibly have been adjudicated either way for all that Dougie Freedman acknowledged the veracity of the decision… and yet the home side didn’t lie down as we seemed to struggle, suddenly, to capitalise on what should have been an unplayable two-goal and one-man advantage.  The home side pulled a goal back… Cathcart conceded a free kick on the edge of the box, Gardner curled the ball over the wall and under the bar, an admirable feat… and yet perhaps, on the replay, close enough to Gomes that you’d hope that he’d get a finger to it. We had no sense of this at the time, our heads were in our hands.

5- So this was a massive result on several levels.  Bottom line, of course, the three points, sure, given.  But beyond that proof of the unshakable single-mindedness of this squad.  A huge challenge laid down by Bournemouth, Norwich and Boro on Tuesday night as we all stamped grumpily around our kitchens lamenting the collective failings of Leeds, Reading and Wolves.  All the pressure, all the focus was on us and Forest played the role of a fair-to-middling side with something to prove but nothing to lose to a tee.  And the squad came through it, came through the game and came through that iffy second half spell when Forest smelled blood bullish and defiant and roaring.  It shouldn’t have been in doubt, we’ve demonstrated our spirit in coming from behind so many times, but still hugely inspiring to see them not give a stuff about what had happened the night before.  Alex Neil had been unable to resist the temptation to put further pressure on Watford with a “let’s see if they’re up to this” kinda quote on Tuesday night.  Right back atcha Alex.  Yooooooooooorns.  Next?