Calderwood: Time To Prove Potency

Colin Calderwood today challenged Nottingham Forest’s strikers to prove they are capable of being League One match-winners.

Forest face Scunthorpe in a match that could make or break their title hopes.

Scunthorpe boast the division’s most influential striker, in the form of 24 goal Billy Sharp, with the Iron claiming 43 of their 73 points from matches in which Sharp has scored.

Now Calderwood wants his forwards to provide the goals that can have a similar impact before the end of the season.

‘We have to have freshness, we need people who can head and tackle, but we also need goal scorers in the team,’ said Calderwood. ‘That is important.

‘Scunthorpe have proved that with Sharp, the prowess he has as a goalscorer has definitely helped them.

‘The number of goals they give away is minimal, so suddenly a Sharp goal is enough to win them the match.

‘That is what has happened, even through their recent good run, when teams have posed them problems.

‘Now we have got to pose them problems – and beat them.’

Calderwood feels Junior Agogo – with five goals in four matches – can have a match-winning impact.

And he believes there are three or four other players who could also fill the role.

‘Junior has done it already,’ he said. ‘The strikers have all played well recently.

‘If you were to give a team a pick of any striker they wanted in the division, a lot would take Sharp.

‘But I’d bet that a lot would take any one of our strikers as well.

‘Jack, Junior, Grant Holt. Nathan Tyson played very well at Brighton, looking very dangerous, before he got sent off and has missed matches.’

Forest are looking for revenge for the 4-0 thrashing Scunthorpe handed out at the City Ground earlier in the season.

But Calderwood feels Forest have more firepower to hit back this time.

‘We have to pose them a threat,’ he said. ‘But when we played at home Junior was away on international duty and Tyson and Dobie were injured.

‘We had Grant and Jack, they were our only two strikers. Now it is slightly different. Scott Dobie is back, so is Nathan.

‘We have, in theory, got a potent threat. But we have to prove that, because on Tuesday we did not look like we would score a goal.’