Forest 2 Sheffield Wednesday 1

By: Tim | January 30th, 2009

got to hand it to him... If your own manager describes a win as ‘unbelievable’, you know you’ve just picked up a vital three points. Forest started without Cohen and Big Wes on Tuesday, the former due to injury, the latter was still out for personal reasons. It gets worse too, as we can now add Earnshaw, Tyson and Breckin to the injury list, all three of which were already playing with knocks.

Davies drafted in McCleary, Arron Davies and Joe Heath for the game, coming back from 1 nil down was testament to our grit and determination. Just before the half hour mark Wednesday were able to capitalise on some dodgy defending, leaving Johnson enough space to toe poke the ball in the net from three yards. Their goal prompted some tinkering from Davies – he pushed McCleary on to the left flank, put Tyson on the right and switched Davies to a central role behind Earnshaw.

Less than five minutes later, and after some great work by McCleary, it was fully justified – Tyson latched on to a perfect through ball to strike home from just outside the box. Another five minutes later and things got even rosier after Franny Jeffers (yep, the same Franny Jeffers that Arsene Wenger paid £9 million for back in 2001) received a red card for a two-footed challenge on Heath.

After a nervy beginning to the second-half, which saw Tudgay missing a great chance, and Earnshaw limp off through injury, we managed to regain our stride when McCleary put the ball in the net. Sadly it was ruled out for offside, but it kick started our half, after which both Tyson and Garner had chances, before Luke Chambers finally gave us the lead with a flicked header that went in off the post. Wednesday didn’t have much left to give, and we clung on for what could end up being crucial points. As ever, you can watch the highlights here.

Billy Davies was justifiably proud of our achievement, especially after coming back from 1 nil down: ‘One thing you cannot fault, from this young side, is their courage to come back from a goal down; their work ethic, their team spirit and their desire to go on and win matches’. By the looks of it we’re going to need a lot more courage and spirit though, the injury list is growing longer by the game, and Garner picked up his fifth booking of the season too, which means he’ll be banned for the Derby match.

Davies has spoken about his desire for a five-man strike force recently, with Chris Porter reportedly on his way to Cardiff, I can’t help but wonder who he is going to get in before the transfer window ends this Saturday. We’ve got Cardiff away tomorrow as it happens, the good news is that Big Wes should finally be back in the side, but if we don’t get any new faces in then we’ll have to rely on Billy’s new training regime, and a lot more of that ‘united’ team spirit.