Win only delays the inevitable

How many lives does Colin Calderwood have? He has to be one of the luckiest people in football. I honestly thought he had gone on Wednesday as rumours of his sacking/resignation reached fever pitch, and yet that's all it turned out to be – a rumour. It just goes to show how damaging the internet can be. I suppose we only have ourselves to blame for believing it.

A very lucky win over Barnsley has probably saved his job for another couple of weeks now. No doubt a defeat at Coventry will be deemed acceptable by the Forest hierarchy, so then he will be given the two subsequent home games against Sheffield United and Blackpool. Yes, more games to mess up, and fewer games for whoever happens to replace him to pull off a rescue mission.

Obviously it was very important that we got three points yesterday and I am glad we did, because had we lost, we would be seven points adrift, but the performance was all the same very poor and we were grateful to the woodwork and Lee Camp as Barnsley ripped our defence apart all too easily. They dominated the first half, so Forest could consider themselves fortunate to be going in at half time a goal to the good courtesy of a Joe Garner header.

Forest were being overran in midfield too much, and our defence was being heavily exposed. Calderwood was clearly going for the jugular, playing three strikers, even though Robbie Earnshaw was clearly still not match fit. He did make a very brave decision to bring in Brendan Maloney at right back. Maloney had been on loan at non-League Rushdon and Diamonds, but he was recalled on Thursday. Calderwood's decision to drop Luke Chambers for him paid off as Maloney made a number of key tackles, and looked like an accomplished full back. I am not sure whether he is the answer or not, but he looked better there than Chambers, so that is something. Unfortunately, right back is not the only part of our defence that has needed strengthening. Kelvin Wilson has been playing very badly this season, and Joel Lynch has failed to convince me that he is an adequate left back so far. Hopefully we will try and sign a central defender and a new full back in the January transfer window. Let's just hope we can get through the next month and not lose too many games, because it will be hard to attract good players if they think we are going down.

It's very annoying to think that if we had beaten Norwich last Saturday, we would now be out of the relegation zone. But I guess with so many games against teams scrapping for survival, there was bound to be one or two setbacks along the way. We have lost only one of our last seven games, but we have drawn too many of them. Draws are no good when you are bottom of the table. Our home form is very iffy, so it's not as if we can rely on that to get us out of trouble. I think we're actually playing better away from home at the moment, which is quite ironic really as before the Crystal Palace game, we had lost them all. I think the players feel quite intimidated playing in front of big crowds, most of them baying for their blood if they don't perform. That's something that must be addressed because we will not win many away matches this season. If we are to avoid going back down again, it's our home form that will save us.

A change is going to come

As I write this, it would seem that Forest are already in the process of interviewing potential new managers, if rumours in the press this morning are anything to go by. Judging by Colin Calderwood's strange behaviour after the final whistle at Doncaster where he shook every Forest player's hand and went over to the supporters, despite them chanting for his resignation suggests that he knows his time is up as Forest continue to lie six points adrift at the bottom of the Championship.

The Daily Mail ran an exclusive saying that Sam Allerdyce is poised to take over, while the Guardian say that Billy Davies, Iain Dowie (God I hope not) and Ady Boothroyd, the recently axed Watford manager, could all be in the frame. My first choice would have to be Big Sam. I think he would be just what this Club needs in a relegation battle, and he would lift us out of the doldrums, if only temporarily. He may be quite controversial and outspoken at times, but the most successful managers often are. Calderwood is about as inspiring as a soggy iceberg lettuce that's past its sell-by date. The idea that he is capable of turning our fortunes around and pulling off a rescue act is just laughable. His interviews are increasingly becoming self-parodic. In the Nottingham Evening Post today, he says he's the 'perfect man for the job'. What job would that be then? Turning Forest into the biggest laughing stock in football by making us the worst ever Championship team with the lowest points total?

I think Calderwood was told that if he didn't win at Doncaster then he would be sacked, and after another lifeless display from Forest, which would have resulted in a defeat if Doncaster weren't just as bad, it would seem that finally (although God knows how it took him so long), Nigel Doughty has run out of patience. I've also just read that Calderwood was nowhere to be seen at this morning's training session. Interesting!!

You've had your chance, Forest, and you've blown it

Oh no, Forest. I thought we'd got over this. I really thought we'd turned the proverbial corner, but the home defeat against ten man Norwich is a real hammer blow, and I am not convinced we will recover from it now.

It really was a bad day for us results wise. Southampton pulled off an unlikely win at Reading, and third-from-bottom Watford, with a new management team in place, earned a convincing win at home to QPR. Not only that, but Doncaster drew at Burnley, which meant we swapped places with them at the bottom of the table. So taking all this into account, the game against Norwich, who were five points head of us at the start of play, was even more crucial than it was before. I really believed that we were going to win the game and at worst feared we may only draw it, so the fact that we lost to a side that had struggled really badly away from home despite them being reduced to ten men after only twenty minutes, is really hard to take. Victory would have put us on level pegging with Charlton and dragged Norwich right into it, but instead we remain bottom and are now six points adrift again.

You would think that after Norwich had a man sent off, Forest would really seize control of the game, but instead they found themselves trailing just three minutes after Gary Doherty was giving his marching orders for a professional foul on Nathan Tyson. Forest had defended very poorly straight from the kick off and were struggling to cope with Norwich's pace up front. Kelvin Wilson seemed to be largely at fault for the goal as he failed to clear the ball properly, enabling Martin Patterson to score.

The defence had done really well during the unbeaten run, but it really looked very shaky yesterday evening. Wilson was especially poor, and looks like his confidence has taken a huge knock. Ever since he was handed the captaincy, he has not performed nearly as well. I just don't think he is a leader, but then again who is? We don't have any at all, and when you're in a crisis, you really need a good captain. I just can't think of anyone who would be suitable for the job. I never rated Ian Breckin as a captain before, but I do think he should come back into the side for Wilson at the moment, because at least he's got experience and maturity.

I thought we looked quite good going forward in the first half and we did create a few good chances to score with Joe Garner forcing a good save out of the Norwich goalkeeper, but the final ball was again found wanting, and there was a touch of fortune about Paul Anderson's equaliser five minutes before half time. He did well to turn with the ball, but the shot itself should have been saved. But still, it was good to see Anderson actually get on the scoresheet. He has been quite frustrating so far showing odd flashes of brilliance, but also giving the ball away far too much. At the moment I don't think he's anything special, but then he is playing for Colin Calderwood, and how many good players have been made to look rubbish under his management?

Once we had got the equaliser, I thought we'd go on to win, but in the second half we were dreadful. Gareth McCleary had come on at half time for Matt Thornhill, which should have made us more of an attacking threat, but if anything we just got worse. McCleary looked like he had got stage fright performing in front of the cameras and kept losing possession. Forest just began to lose their way, and in the 73rd minute only had themselves to blame when they defended poorly again when Luke Chambers haplessly put through his own net when trying to clear the ball. Perhaps his luck had run out, having seen Lee Camp save an injury time penalty awarded against him at Bristol City last week.

But although it was Chambers who scored the own goal that lost us the game, I think most of the blame should be directed firmly at Calderwood. Straight after Norwich had gone back in front, he took off left back Joe Heath, and asked our main source of creativity in midfield Chris Cohen to go and play in defence. And even worse he replaced Cohen with Garner! So we were left with just Tyson up on his own up front despite us being 2-1 behind and needing to win the game! If that's not proof that Calderwood doesn't know what he's doing, I don't know what is. When you're losing a game at home that you simply must win and playing against ten men, playing one up front is just ridiculous. The commentators on the TV said we were a 'one-trick pony' and were just trying to lump mainly useless long-balls up to Tyson all the time. When you have your manager deploying stupid tactics like these, it's no wonder we are where we are in the table.

I was dreading the Doncaster game, but I am not now. In a strange way I feel quite relaxed about it. I have made up my mind that we are going down now no matter what happens on Tuesday night. We're coming up to the midway point in the season and we have just 12 points so far out of a possible 54. That means we've only managed to earn 22% of the points available to us so far. In order to reach the 50-point barrier, which would probably be enough for us to survive, we'd need 38 points from the remaining 84, and that means we need to more than double our percentage return for the rest of the season. Even the most optimistic person in the world would have to conceive that that would be a really tall order.

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's Super Camp!!

If somebody said to me after the Cardiff defeat a few weeks ago that we would get five points from our next three away trips to Crystal Palace, Derby and Bristol City, I would have asked if they were feeling alright.

When we lost to Cardiff, I thought that was it, we're going down. But then a few days later we managed to overturn the odds and defeat Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park and bring an end to our awful six-game losing streak on our travels. That victory came as a very timely fillip as we prepared for the trip to Derby. Another good performance there aided by a huge slice of refereeing incompetence earned us a deserved point, and despite us being ravaged by injury and illness for the home game against Birmingham, we dominated the game and should have walked away with all three points.

I had no idea what to expect against Bristol City, though. They were just outside the play-off places, so a draw would be a good result, although considering our parlous position at the foot of the Championship, we really could do with another win. And we did make a good fist of it, going ahead through Joe Garner, who finally broke his goalscoring duct for us, early in the game. Bristol City, though, took advantage of our sloppiness in retaining possession, and they equalised not long before half time. But when Nathan Tyson restored our lead just two minutes into the second half, I must admit that I thought we'd go on to win the game.

Unfortunately, though, we were not able to hold on as City equalised from a corner with eleven minutes remaining. And as the home side were applying so much pressure by then, I feared we were going to throw it all away and leave empty-handed. And were it not for a certain Mr Lee Camp, that's exactly what would have happened as in the dying seconds of injury time, just like at Derby, the referee pointed to the penalty spot. And just like at Derby, Luke Chambers was the player responsible for the kick being awarded. But this time, there was no doubt at all that it should be a penalty as Chambers had made a rather unnecessary rash tackle. It would have been a crying shame if he had cost us the game as he had been playing well, but the Forest fans would have just remembered that one incident and lambasted him for it. He can thank his lucky stars then that Camp was once again donning his superman outfit and pulled off another terrific save to deny Michael McIndoe and prevent what would have been a very unjust defeat for Forest.

Obviously it is very disappointing that we couldn't hold on to our lead, but I am pleased with the result. We played very well again and if our shooting had been sharper we could have won quite comfortably, but we can't expect Forest to have instant success overnight. Only a very stubborn person could deny that we have improved massively in the last three or four weeks. We have gone from a team that loses every week drained of confidence and no idea what scoring a goal feels like to one that has gone four games unbeaten, including three away from home against tricky opposition. We have also scored six goals in our last four, and have been unlucky not to score more. If that is not progress, I don't know what is. I honestly expected us to be half relegated by now, so the fact that the gap has now been cut down to four points is a lot better, and with a glut of games coming up before Christmas against the so-called lesser lights of the Championship, I think we have a great chance of getting ourselves out of the bottom three before the bells usher in the start of 2009.

Strikeforce must get its act together if we are to survive

When I heard the team news before the game against Birmingham, I must admit I thought that we were going to be on the receiving end of a thumping, so the fact that we dominated a lot of the game and managed to hold the second-placed team shows how much we have improved in the last few weeks.

No fewer than six of the players who started the game against Derby last week were missing, with injury, illness and suspension giving Colin Calderwood no choice but to make a lot of changes. For a game against one of the Championship's most potent strikeforces, the last thing Forest needed was for their defence to be weakened, but with both Joel Lynch and Julian Bennett being unavailable, it meant that Joe Heath would be handed a rare start at left back, and a recall for Luke Chambers at right back, so James Perch could switch to midfield and fill in for the injured Carl Fletcher. I was quite surprised that Ian Breckin was dropped to the bench after a couple of good performances away from home. I felt that he deserved to keep his place, especially as Kelvin Wilson and Wes Morgan had been less than solid together so far this season.

When we went behind quite early, I thought that we were going to be in for a long afternoon. Birmingham were torturing our makeshift defence and there was a sense of inevitability when they finally made the breakthrough. But to Forest's credit, they did not let their heads drop, as might have been the case earlier on in the season when going behind. There seemed to be a new air of confidence about them following a couple of good away results at Crystal Palace and Derby. The defence gradually began to get its act together as the first half wore on, and by half time, Forest could consider themselves hard done by not to be at least level, considering how much possession they had.

Forest were excellent in everything but their finishing in the second half, and made Birmingham look like an average midtable side, rather than one which had won nine of their fifteen games so far this season. Our hard work and endeavour was finally rewarded seven minutes after the restart when James Perch headed the ball home following a free kick from Chris Cohen. And from then on Forest dominated the rest of the match with Nathan Tyson causing the Brum defence all sorts of trouble. He had numerous good opportunities to score but much to the Forest fans' frustration, he was thwarted every time.

Having been convinced that we were going to be thrashed, I cheered when the referee blew his whistle. I would definitely have taken a point before the game, but I can't help but think what might have been if we had better finishers at the Club. Joe Garner for me has been disappointing so far, and Tyson's final ball seems to have deserted him, scoring once all season. Worryingly Rob Earnshaw, who sat out the game with a calf injury, is very injury prone, and this means that he'll constantly be playing catch-up just to get his match fitness back. That is not good for Forest at all. The fact that our top scorer in the League is Mr Own Goal tells you all you need to know.

There is no doubt that we are improving a lot. I did say that we'd be lucky to get one point from the last three games, so the fact that we have got five is really impressive, but we do need to start picking up wins quickly, because the other teams above us are starting to pull away now. We're still five points adrift, and our goal difference is not getting any better as we are just not scoring enough. Fortunately there are quite a few poor teams around us, and we will be playing many of them in the next few weeks. If we can pick up a lot of points between now and Christmas I think we'll be alright. The determination and team spirit is definitely there, so at least we've got two of those qualities needed in a relegation battle. They were missing the last time we went down, so I am a bit more hopeful that we will get ourselves out of trouble, but that won't happen if our strikers don't start scoring goals soon.

Lady luck is in our Camp at last

Forest have complained a lot of being unlucky this season, but I don't think anybody can argue that we didn't have more than our fair share of it in the crazy dying stages at Pride Park.

My heart sank when the referee pointed to the penalty spot after Derby had scored what looked to be a stoppage-time winner. I've no idea why the goal was disallowed anyway. Luke Chambers was accused of handling it, but whether he did or didn't, Derby had scored a legitimate goal. Then Lee Camp superbly saved Nacer Barazite's spot-kick, which would definitely have won the game for them as there were just seconds left. I went from being absolutely distraught to ecstatic in the space of seconds. But then Derby scored again through Miles Addison, it looked like they had got justice. But bizarrely the referee Stuart Attwell again disallowed it for no apparent reason at all. And we nearly committed the greatest robbery of the 21st century when Paul Anderson was clean through on goal at the other end only to scuff his shot. To be honest, even though three points certainly would have come in handy, if we had won after all the controversy at the other end, people would have been saying we didn't deserve it, and I would have to agree. We did play well, don't get me wrong, but I can't deny that Derby should have had the three points.

With all that happened right at the end of the game, it's easy to forget about the goals that had been allowed. We started the second half very brightly and were rewarded for that when Emanuel Villa put through his own net following a corner. But Villa made up for it by scoring at the right end to equalise from a Kris Commons free kick eleven minutes later, and when Lewis McGugan was sent off for a rash challenge, I decided that if we could hold on for a point, it would be a good result all things taken into consideration.

The referee was card-happy, booking five of our players and sending off McGugan, and it resulted in both Carl Fletcher, who was replaced by Chambers at half time, and Joe Garner being substituted to protect them against being sent off. Both kept rubbing the referee up the wrong way, and I suppose it was only a matter of time before one of them was shown the red card, so Colin Calderwood was right to take them off. But it's just a shame that in Fletcher's case it meant that James Perch had to go back into midfield and Chambers replaced him at right back. We had looked comfortable in defence in the first half, but Chambers was exploited a lot on the right hand side and really struggled. Perch had been ok there, and it makes me wonder if things had stayed as they were, we might have held on for a vital win.

Still, I am very happy with a point, and we could so easily have been cut adrift by ten points after the trips to Palace and Derby. To get four points from them is very good after losing all our previous six games on our travels. I think we are definitely improving, and now it doesn't feel like a lost cause any more. In previous relegation battles that I have known supporting Forest, we have gone down with not much of a fight, but I think there is definitely a lot of fight in this team. We are looking like a good side with Anderson and Garner. I just pray both can stay fit, because they are very injury prone. The defence is also getting a bit better, and I think this is largely down to the presence of Camp in goal. He has been brilliant for us since he joined two weeks ago. I hope we can sign him permanently. I just feel a whole lot more confident with him in goal and now understand why Paul Smith was dropped.

As for Calderwood, he has saved his job for the time being. I would love to see him succeed here, because believe it or not I don't actually hate the man. The only thing that matters is Forest, and if he is successful, then Forest are. We are now five points adrift of safety, which at this stage of the season, early in November, is not that terrible. If we're still in the relegation zone in a month's time and we're five or six points adrift then, then we should start panicking, but we have some big games in November against struggling sides. Norwich and Barnsley visit us on consecutive weekends, and we also go to Doncaster, who are now bottom instead of us (yippee). First of all, though, we have to somehow avoid a good thrashing next week at home to Birmingham. I think everything rests on how well we defend. I fear a good hammering will set us back and we will lose all our confidence again. That must not happen. If we do lose, then we must keep our heads held high and move on to the next game, because Birmingham are a very good side, and we are still trying to adapt to life back in the Championship. We have undoubtedly made a lot of progress in the last couple of weeks. Having Anderson, Garner and Rob Earnshaw in the side has without a doubt been a huge factor and also playing 4-4-2 to accommodate those players has also helped immensely. Even though we are second from bottom and five points adrift, I think we have a good side now, and we are no longer the no-hopers of the division. I think that honour now befalls Doncaster, and maybe even Charlton who are just above us. They, however, will probably get out of it as Alan Pardew will almost certainly be sacked after they lost 3-0 at home to Barnsley.

We just need to find two other teams who are worse than us, but nobody apart from Doncaster and us have been on dreadful losing streaks yet, so it's difficult to gauge at the moment which teams are going to be in the relegation mix in the last few months of the season. I keep thinking of that home game on the final day against Southampton, who are also struggling, and my stomach churns. To save our Championship status on the final day with a win over the Saints would be as good as beating Yeovil last season when we were promoted. But if it went wrong...no let's not even go there.