Forest 1 Burnley 2 – Clarets leave Forest with a red face

By: Tim | September 15th, 2008

As arrogant as this may sound, and without wishing to offend any Burnley fans, with home advantage this was a game I expected us to win. Or at least draw.

So what went wrong? As usual it was a healthy mix of dodgy tactics and poor defending, with a spot of bad refereeing thrown in for good measure.

Like most Forest fans I am accustomed to hearing Calderwood wheel out the usual platitudes after a match, I’m beginning to grow tired of it though, and I’ve come to realise that if you want a realistic view of the match (from a manager) then you have to look to the opposition. Owen Coyle had this to say: ‘Forest dominated possession at times, but we had some fantastic opportunities to score. We got to grips with things and could have had three or four in the end’.

On the other hand, Calderwood had this to say: ‘I can’t be too harsh on the players, they put in a great effort and there was a good response in the second half. We’ve got to look back at things we did well’. No, Colin, you need to look back at where we are going wrong, and then try to improve those areas. You could start by having a look at your tactics; do you think that 4-3-3 might be leaving us vulnerable to the counter-attack? Perhaps you should tell your keeper and defenders to stop hitting long balls to a striker that is 5 foot 8. Maybe you could give the substitutes some instructions before they go on, so they don’t look as bemused as the rest of the crowd do.

While we were hard done to with the penalty decision for Burnley’s second goal, and both Burnley goals were from set-pieces, Forest were set up all wrong, 4-3-3 just isn’t working. We did have a lot of possession, too, but it wasn’t long before Burnley nullified our threat and were on the counter-attack. Instrumental to this was one simple tactical switch - Coyle had the sense to move Graham Alexander to defensive midfield: ‘I decided to use Graham in front of the back four as I know if he gets on the ball he can pass it’. He scored both Burnley goals and was key to most of Burnley’s play.

I’m finding it hard to believe that Calderwood possesses the tactical wherewithal to pull off a similar move. We’ve shipped 12 goals in five games, and already have the worst goal difference in the league, second only to Burnley and Southampton. If CC isn’t looking at bringing in a few defenders then things can only get worse. Don’t get me wrong, I’m usually a glass half-full man myself, but with performances like these it is hard to see us being anywhere other than a relegation dog-fight come next April.

Chris Cohen, our one standout player from last Saturday, obviously disagrees with me, and the general consensus amongst Forest fans is ‘give it until Christmas for things to improve’ - we’re only 5 games in to the season after all. There’s an unimportant match at Pride Park in November however, depending on how things work out this match could be the beginning of the end for Colin.