Time for some reflections on where we are as a club...
Timestamp: 62 days into the 2025-26 season. 3 league games and 22 days under Nuno. 4 league, 2 European and 1 domestic cup game and 40 days under Postecoglu. Chelsea at home tomorrow.
After achieving European qualification at least a couple of seasons ahead of schedule we had to consider how to adapt our strategy to fit our new reality.
We suddenly became able to offer a future good enough to keep players we had expected to leave with Murillo and MGW unexpectedly staying.
We also knew we had to build a new type of squad, to move from the small tight consistent first 11, so as to compete in 50% more fixtures. This is not Nuno's preferred method but he earned the chance to try.
We also took the decision to at the same time evolve our playing style from the low block with fast counterattack, to look to be able to win a possession based game against teams who sit in against us.
This was always going to be a calculated risk - because it moves away from the approach that played to the teams strengths and had the astonishing success last season. There is a reasonable argument that it was necessary if teams were finding us out, but a risk nonetheless.
It's clear that something unplanned happened. Going from giving Nuno a longer contract in July to sacking him within 3 months shows it was not an intended shift. Nuno and Edu falling out was highly problematic but conceivably manageable.
Nuno's gripes at not having a fully expanded squad for pre-season seem wholly unreasonable given how transfer deadline dynamics work. Forest had an excellent window in keeping the squad together other than Elanga whilst using the income to decisively upgrade forward, wing, centre midfield, keeper and centre back positions. In fact it was only full back where we are not stronger in quality (despite 2 additions.)
Nuno clearly engineered an exit via the media but what led to it is less clear. It does sound like Maranakis got his head turned by national pride with a fellow Greek manager winning the Europa league and the two clearly had personal contact prior to these changes.
We had come to see the Forest of recent years as much more professional - in the Brighton mould - with a clear idea about our playing philosophy informing recruitment and a list of future manager and backroom staff targets.
The strategic play being made was an appointment that would enable a Europa season to result in future European competition (ideally champions league from a Europa win) whilst being settled in upper mid table in the league. That in turn promised the potential to keep and further build a highly potential first eleven mostly at an age with their best football ahead of them.
Ange Postecoglu was a left field appointment for this brief that didn't look like it was off that target list. A high press, inverted fullback, high chances created and conceded to outscore the opposition was a huge lurch for the Forest squad - not something to do mid season with no preseason coaching window to iron out vulnerabilities
That lurch in playing philosophy, together with a 17th placed Premier league finish with Spurs meant concern and scrutiny were elevated from day one.
Ange had been blessed with a bionic start at Spurs winning 7 of his first 8 when Kane was in his pomp. But that was the exception not the norm for his tenures in club management. His Won 0 Drawn 2 Lost 5 start, the worst by a forest manager in over a century, was similar to his start at Celtic.
The owners judgment - that the team could do a mid season pivot to a totally different style with instant results - seemed reckless from the start.
The whiplash for fans has been of a scale few can expect to experience. The eager expectation of a first European season after 30 years of languishing in the third tier. An owner making smart moves off the field to strengthen and seemingly capitalise on the big chance to stabilise on the edge of European places. Having Brazil’s starting number 9 together with a prodigy of a centre back, and Morgan and Elliott taking England by storm.
The signs of faltering in the last 2 moths of last season were easily put down to fatigue and the 3rd place spot occupied for most of the year was enough to limp to the first tier of Europe only to be upgraded when it turned out the palace chairman doesn't read his emails so didn't comply with uefa rules.
The first two games started well enough. A sparkling home demolition of Brentford and a creditable away point at Crystal Palace something to build on. But after the media fireworks the team seemed affected and failed to beat put a dreadful west ham team to the sword before capitulation with 3 rapid goals conceded.
But almost overnight, the city ground faithful have had to come to terms with the resurfacing of something we’ve not had to consider for more than a season - jeopardy. Jeopardy of two kinds both of which will not be good for the blood pressure of the men of my age on the terraces….
The first is in-game peril. Under Nuno Forest had become somewhat predictable in being good at shutting up shop if we take a lead, and excellent at soaking up pressure, yet a golden glove keeper and - centre back partnership spoken of in glowing terms as second only to Arsenal. We were, let’s be candid, not creating loads of chances, but when we did our conversion rate - Chris Wood’s in particular - was peerless. The small squad and largely settled tactics - 4231 with a back 5 Morato appearance to close out games - became the norm. Not that it was boring - electric pace on the breakaway and a front four chemistry that had Morgan Gibbs-White shown a deafness of touch and silky creative passing as good as we’ve ever seen by the Trent. People hadn’t sussed out how to prevent Callum’s signature move, and nobody could catch Elanga.
The second is relegation jeopardy. It is a feature of our instant success culture that a bad run of 4 league games in the first 7 of 38 has us reaching for the ‘break glass’ alarm, but with European and cup games a sense of negative momentum - 7 games no wins - leaves us looking anxiously for signs that there is a plan and strategy to pull the planes nose up before we crash into the mountainside.
But are we really in peril? The issue for us was Forest’s managerial changeover drama squandered what looked on paper like a comparatively easy first 6 fixtures:
Brentford (H) Palace (A) Hammers (H) Arsenal (A) Burnley (A) Sunderland (H)
14 points from the first 6 - 4 wins and 2 draws could have put us back into the top 3 to resume last year’s form before the tougher next six
Newcastle (A) Chelsea (H) Bournemouth (A) Man Utd (H) Leeds (H) Liverpool (A) by last seasons standards might be expecting at best 8 points from this next 6. Not a problem as a combined 22 from 12 would be top six form.
But Forest finished the first 6 with 4 points, after 4 successive league losses.
Comparing our haul vs the same fixtures last year with cumulative points difference
Brentford (H) Won both years (0)
Palace (A) Drew both years (0)
West Ham (H) Lost this season but won last (-3)
Under AP:
Arsenal (A) Lost this season drew last (-4)
Burnley (H) equivalent to Leicester - both draws (-4)
Sunderland (A) equivalent to Ipswich - won last season lost this season (-7)
So overall we can say under Nuno we were 3 points off last years pace and with Ange we are a further 4 points off last years pace.
And the next 2 straight games: Chelsea (H) Bournemouth (A) we lost last season so even if we get nothing we remain 7 points adrift of last year. Not good but not apocalyptic yet.
All that said, the in game stats for Forest now make for ugly reading. Second highest xG conceded in the league so lots of big chances against us. Set pieces so improved last season are again a defensive Achilles heel. And a shot conversion rate down from 20% to 2% tells the story that for all of the extra half chances created from front foot style we are firing blanks.
By switching playing style we seem to have neutralised our strengths both defensively - being leaky rather than soaking up pressure - and going forward where we can’t break down teams that we previously would have counterattacked.
Two poor Europa league results have turned us from second favourites to needing an uptick to qualify at all from the group stages
The huge question is how to manage the risk of a relegation catastrophe, and whether doing so writes off our European and cup aspirations too soon.
AP is a high-risk high-reward white knuckle ride. We’ve seen in the first half against Betis that when it clicks with his teams it can be extremely good. And the signs are our squad are taking instruction well. But we also know Ange has won 8 of the last 38 premier league games he has managed, a full season points haul of THIRTY. Even despite context of injuries and being safe from a poor bottom three so playing first string team in Europe, those are scary numbers in a season where a high 30s points tally will likely be needed to beat the drop.
But there is a wider implication of a move to a safety first manager in Dyche. The floor is lower but so - maybe - is the ceiling. Forest rip up the intended playing style change and dig in for mid table with the hope to go again the following year.
Except we have had the luxury of building from strength and that would be gone. MGW, Murillo, Anderson, Luiz. None will want to stay for a season that has no promise of Europe. We may recoup decent money but it becomes a rebuilding job and a club less able to attract good players with nothing beyond the domestic to offer them. This is what we are trading off for certainty of safety. So pulling the trigger prematurely has a big cost, although each game it fails to click and the fan hostility may easily lock us into a tailspin that is better pulled out of sooner than later.
There is one move - in my view - that could keep alive the project. Pay the £8m to buy out Silva’s contract. A style that better fits our players. A reset from the media war zone that Ange has so quickly become engulfed in. And a reward of a European adventure for a manager who will be sought after when his Fulham contract ends - and is known to be unhappy at getting just 1 signing.
It seems mad that the club will invest over £30m in players not even in the first 11 but would not spend to get the best managerial option possible. Finishing 5 places higher in the league would completely pay off the fee from greater premier league prize money.
All eyes on Marinakis unless Ange can pull off an unlikely victory over a rejuvenated Chelsea team.
Have a seat, Jeopardy. I think you could be with us for a while.
