The two form teams in the Championship meet on Tuesday evening with Forest having won their last 4 games & Barnsley their last three. Barnsley are becoming something of a late goals specialist this season with 7 goals scored in the last 15 minutes of games including their last three consecutively & nine of their 14 league goals have come in the second half of games. Forest have also scored 14 goals this season which have been split evenly with 7 first half goals & 7 second half goals.
Forest came out on top last season taking 4 points of the South Yorkshire club with a solitary Joe Garner goal separating them at the City Ground & a Rob Earnshaw equalizer cancelling out a Campbell-Ryce opener to earn a 1 all draw at Oakwell.
A win for Barnsley in this fixture could see them move to within 2 points of the play off places while a home win for the reds could see them get as close as 2 points from the 2 automatic slots.
Vital Quotes:
‘we are very much a work in progress but I am very proud of the way my players are maturing and developing’
Nottingham Forest Team News:
Perch & Bennett are both still some way from a return & Earnshaw has been ruled out for a few weeks but there are no new injuries worries following the weekends fixture against Newcastle. There could be a couple rested though after the hard work put in by Dexter Blackstock & the aging legs of Paul McKenna.
Player to watch: Dexter Blackstock
Although the word prolific may be a little extreme after just a quarter of the season his 5 goals in 11 league games (3 of those as a sub) so far make him our most important striker & has 6 goals in 14 games in all competition as well as weighing in with a couple of assists.
Barnsley Team News:
Barnsley have almost a fully fit squad to choose from with only Bobby Hassell out with an achilles injury, Anderson Da Silva was the Barnsley creative force in midfield and has been out since late September with a hamstring injury but was deemed fit enough to take a place on the bench in the Tykes 1 – 0 away win at Doncaster last weekend & came on for half an hour so may get a starting place
Player to watch: Iain Hume
After spending a year out of the game following that horrendous challenge with Chris Morgan, Hume has bounced back with some great performances this season and has helped himself to 2 goals and 2 assists in his 8 starts + 3 substitute appearances.
Match Facts & Stats
Both teams have shown a similar lack of discipline on the pitch with Forest committing 152 fouls & Barnsley 151, they have accumulated 38 bookings between them & have both seen a player sent off. Although both teams have scored the same amount of goals, that’s where the attacking similarities end, with Forest have registered 142 attempts at goal (76 on target) & Barnsley just 115 (55 on target) but the major difference between the two is in the defensive area with Barnsley conceding almost double the amount of goals having shipped 21 goals in their 12 games & Forest averaging just 1 goal conceded per game.
This will be the 66th league meeting between these two teams (Yes that’s right, would you believe that in the 1939/40 season that was abandoned after 3 games we also played Barnsley away, we lost that fixture 4 – 0, scorers not known) & it’s been incredibly close over the years with Forest & Barnsley sharing 24 wins each, leaving us with 17 draws. Forest have though out-scored their next opponents by 95 goals to 90.
the other game from the season that never was, was a 2 – 1 win against Newport County, so probably won’t come up for a while
Ref Watch:
Nigel Miller of County Durham will take charge of this fixture (some of you may remember him from the 1st leg of the Play Off semi-final against Yeovil when forest ran out 2 – 0 winners thanks to Mr Miller awarding us 2 iffy penalties)
He will be assisted by Tony Horton (West Midlands) and Dean Mohareb (Cheshire)
Fourth Official Mike Blackledge of Cambridgeshire
Match Prediction:
Forest have stopped leaking poor goals recently & Barnsley have conceded 21 so far, comfortable Forest win this time then, Reds 3 – 0 tykes
Next Fixtures:
Saturday, 24 October 15:00
The Football League Championship
Crystal Palace v Nottm Forest
