Anderson fractured his arm and dislocated his wrist, and he will now face the next six weeks on the sidelines. At this stage of the season, that is very bad news when you are denied the services of one of your best players in the relegation run-in. I am really worried how we will cope without him. It is probably not a coincidence that Forest's improvement in form since the start of November has coincided with Anderson's presence in the side. When he was injured the first time round, we were really struggling to score goals. Now I fear the same may happen again. Let's just hope that Billy Davies signs somebody immediately. We need somebody with proven Championship ability and with plenty of pace, as Forest for all their other faults this season have always been very dangerous as an attacking force.
I hope Davies doesn't give his namesake Arron a chance to prove himself, because he is quite clearly only League One standard, and we can't afford to waste much time testing players out. We need to keep this winning run going, because before you know it we will be down to ten games, and then five, and then the season is over.
Had Anderson not been injured, I think we may have gone on to win the match as we were playing so well in the second half and were really dominant. We were very poor before the break and were outplayed, and Derby to be quite frank deserved their lead, but the substitution of Joel Lynch, who had been awful at left back, shored up our defence and we looked so much better. We were rewarded for our excellent spell when Rob Earnshaw equalised not long after the hour mark. Unfortunately, that dreadful injury to Anderson rather knocked the wind out of our sails, and were it not for a string of brilliant reaction saves from Paul Smith, we would have lost the game near the end. All in all, though, I think based on the two halves, a draw was a very fair result. Now we must return to the City Ground for the replay, which is guaranteed to attract a full house.
In the meantime, it is back to the much more important business of the Championship. We have a home game with Brian Laws' Sheffield Wednesday on Tuesday night. Three points would be very nice indeed, but it will be a difficult match, and I'm not sure what to expect now considering we've lost Anderson. It will be interesting what Billy Davies does to remedy the problem. We know that Nathan Tyson has been very effective on the left wing in the past, but we can't afford to lose him up front. All I can say, though, is that I have much more faith in Davies than Colin Calderwood to find the answer.
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