'They Can Cause Problems' – Assessing Forest's Threats
- Leicester City face Nottingham Forest in the Emirates FA Cup on Sunday
- The City Ground clash, in the fourth round, is a 4pm GMT kick-off
- Nottinghamshire Live reporter Matt Davies has provided the lowdown on Forest
- He says Steve Cooper's men will be optimistic about their chances against the Foxes
Since the appointment of former Swansea City manager Steve Cooper in September, the East Midlands outfit have steadily climbed the Sky Bet Championship standings, rising from the relegation places to the outskirts of the play-off berths. They're currently eighth, two points adrift of sixth-place.
A victory over Arsenal in the third round of the FA Cup, meanwhile, set up this tie with the Foxes, who lifted the trophy last May. It'll be a first encounter between the two sides in eight years following City's promotion to the Premier League as Championship champions in 2014. That length of time since the last meeting heightens the excitement for Forest fans, says Davies, who believes Cooper's men will be optimistic about their chances of success.
"It means quite a lot," he told LCFC Radio earlier this week. "Leicester have obviously ascended into the Premier League in the last seven or eight years, whereas Forest have been left a little bit behind, so we haven’t had this fixture for such a long time. It makes it a bit more special.
"It’s got a bit of added spice to the occasion as well because it’s in the FA Cup. Forest had a good win in the last round against Arsenal, so it feels like they’ve got some momentum. Everyone’s really looking forward to it."
Forest's decision to replace Chris Hughton in the dugout with Cooper has so far proven to be a success, with the one-time champions of England now on the cusp of mounting a promotion challenge at the end of a season which threatened to become a disappointing one last autumn.
"Hughton obviously has massive respect in the game, he’s a really good guy, but it just didn’t work out," Davies added. "It was a nightmare start to the season. Fans were wondering if they’d even stay in the Championship initially, but Steve Cooper has come in and galvanised the whole football club.
"He can’t do that on his own, he’s got a good team around him, but he’s transformed the whole atmosphere around the place and created that bond within the dressing room but also between the players and the fans. Results have upturned massively. It is a very different football club to the one it was a year ago.
"There’s been changes off the pitch, around recruitment, as well. It feels like everything’s moving in the right direction again after quite a few years in the doldrums.
"When he came in, he spoke publicly and privately about a lack of belief in the squad. They were down on their heels. Within games, if they went a goal behind, I think they were resigned to defeat. He went in there and tried to remind them that they are good players and it is a massive football club.
"Leicester fans won’t want to hear about the European Cups, but he did draw on that. There’s no bigger club in the Championship, really, and he told them it was a privilege and an honour to play for them. It sounds cheesy but he feels that for sure.
"In private, he makes a big deal of the history and the atmosphere of the club. It’s a different atmosphere when it’s a packed house, it was sold out against Barnsley on a Tuesday night recently, so that shows what the club can be, and we saw that against Arsenal.
"Forest would love to get to where Leicester City are right now."
Highlighting players to look out for, Davies picked out Forest's wide men, pointing to Cooper's preference to utilise wing-backs in a fluid system.
"They went toe-to-toe with Arsenal and, in the game, Cooper trusted Jack Colback as a makeshift left-back to man mark Bukayo Saka," he explained. "Djed Spence had a great game and he’s destined for the Premier League. He totally nullified Gabriel Martinelli, who’d had a great season.
"Forest certainly deserved to win the game. I think everyone would recognise that Arsenal just didn’t show up and this will be a different game if Leicester show up. It’ll be a much bigger challenge for Forest, but they're certainly not going into it, as they might have done before, just resigned to defeat.
"They’ll go into it believing they have a decent shot. Everything that Cooper has tried to do has revolved around the wingers and the wing-backs. That’s the way they try to hurt teams. I’ve already mentioned Djed Spence, who’s on loan from Middlesbrough.
"He couldn’t get into their team, but he’s been a revelation. There’s all sorts of Premier League clubs watching him – Spurs, Arsenal… clubs on the continent too. He’s had a great season and he’s combined down the right wing with Brennan Johnson. He’s a really massive talent.
"Forest rejected an £18M offer for him from Brentford to try and get into the play-offs. He’s got seven goals and five assists in his first season in the Championship and, if they can get at Leicester, they’ll cause them problems I’m sure. One thing Forest are suffering with is injuries to key players.
"Lewis Grabban’s out, which is a huge blow, and Joe Worrall’s injured as well. He’s arguably their best defender. They’ve got three really good defenders. A couple of injuries have hurt the cohesion of the team a little bit. They’ve got a couple of new signings coming in.
"Jonathan Panzo and Sam Surridge, it will be interesting to see how they go. James Garner, who’s on loan from Manchester United, if he can get on the ball and try to keep things ticking, then he can hurt Leicester. Obviously, if Leicester play Youri Tielemans and people like that, it’ll be tough.
"Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall seems like a really good player who’s coming on leaps and bounds. It’s going to be a really tough challenge for Forest for sure and I don’t think anyone is denying that, but it’ll be really interesting to see how they can match up against Leicester on Sunday."