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A few thoughts on: Forest 1-2 Wolves

Pffffffft. All ending a little bit flatly this, isn't it? Still, at least Henri Lansbury didn't get booked. What's that? Oh...

By NickMiller
Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images
  • This is going to be a weird last few weeks of the season. Are we pleased because things have got better? Are we going to write this season off completely because of that horrendous few months in the middle? Are we going to blame Dougie Freedman for getting us close but falling away? Were we ever actually close? Whatever, there's now nothing for the remainder of the season, and of course wasn't after the defeat to Norwich last time out, so the remaining games of the season are going to be gently drifting affairs, a team ambling towards the summer and wondering what might've been.
  • Weird game, too. Forest weren't particularly good or bad, and neither were Wolves. It was a lesson in mediocrity, two quite good sides playing just below their respective levels, the difference being, to be reductive for a moment, that Wolves signed a better and more developed striker from Arsenal who ploughed through the Forest defence early in the second-half and slapped home a superb winner. Benik Afobe has 28 goals this season, nine in 14 for Wolves since signing in January, and if they do finish in the playoffs, it will be largely down to him.
  • Still, at least Forest have a relatively easy job of knowing what to improve in the summer. At 56 goals we have the worst defensive record of anyone in the top half, while even without Britt Assombalonga 63 have gone in at the other end. Recruitment will be interesting, too, with the obvious FFP naughty step in mind. Jamaal Lascelles will go to Newcastle, along with Karl Darlow to take up his role as Wide-Eyed Beefcake No.3 on Geordie Shore, while Kelvin Wilson gave another example of why he just isn't good enough. Quite what's happened to him, I'm not sure, but he's been something close to a liability for most of the season, and bloody nearly cost Forest a goal or two with some suspect footwork here.
  • Still, the good news is Jack Hobbs was on the bench. Perhaps he'll be able to stay fit for two, perhaps even three weeks.
  • More good news. Henri Lansbury didn't get booked! Well done Henri. Unfortunately he didn't extend this new-found discipline to not lunging in with a hilariously bad foul to give away the penalty, a candidate for his dumbest ever foul. And there have been a good few of those.
  • Chuba Akpom is bloody rapid. But you can see why he hasn't actually made much goalscoring impact yet. He's raw in the extreme, very unrefined and his touch needs some serious work. Presumably he'll be spending the rest of the season working on this, which is lovely for Arsenal, but now with the season gone one wonders if giving Tyler Walker a few games would be a better use of a spot in the Forest team.
  • Now would be a smashing time for Michail Antonio to get a bit of an injury - not enough to harm him too much, obviously, but just enough to put any opportunistic lower-level Premier League clubs off making a wee bid in the summer. Think of us, Michail.