To be honest, we didn't really deserve to be a goal up at half time. Plymouth had been very much on top, but just didn't take their chances, and what do they know, Forest grab the lead right on half time through the unlikeliest of sources in Chris Gunter, who had until then never scored in senior football. That was just about the only shot on target I can remember us having all match, but it proved to be all that we needed as Plymouth made life very easy for us in the second half as they hardly troubled us at all. Despite our dominance, though, we really struggled to create much, and that is a big concern, whether we got three points or not. We will not come up against many teams as bad as Plymouth this season in the Championship. At the moment they look like they're bound for League One, and if we don't see a big improvement in our performances, we might well be joining them.
Billy Davies has come in for a lot of criticism lately regarding his squad rotation policy, but in an interview with the Nottingham Evening Post he insisted that he would be continuing with it, so it looks like we're just going to have to get used to it. He thinks that each game requires a different set of players, which might be correct to a degree, but there's also a compelling argument that teams need to be settled and have time to learn to play together. If the players are different every game, there's no way they're going to be able to do that. Now even the defence is being rotated, with Luke Chambers failing to win his place back after being rested in mid-week for the Cup game against Blackburn. Kelvin Wilson stayed there instead, which I felt was very unfair on Chambers who had not done much wrong. But that's Davies all over, isn't it? He's always dropping players who are performing well. Namely Paul Anderson, who again was kept out of the side by Joe Garner, who mystifyingly keeps being selected on the right wing despite never actually doing anything good. Needless to say, Garner was replaced by Anderson twenty minutes from the end, and immediately you could see what a difference it made in our attack. Why Davies doesn't see this, I really don't know.
While the players publically say they are okay with the squad rotation system, deep down they must be pretty unhappy. And if we've got unhappy players, when they do come into the side, what good are they going to be to us if their confidence is low? In Forest's case, I think it's much better to have your first choice eleven and stick to it as much as possible. If you're good enough, you play, and if you're not, then you don't. Simple as that. Brian Clough once said that football is a simple game complicated by idiots. I'm not saying Davies is an idiot, but I do think he needs to take one or two leaves out of Cloughie's book if he wants to endear himself to the Forest fans a bit more. The last thing I want is for Davies to fail here, simply because with so many other struggling clubs potentially in the market for new managers, namely Derby and Ipswich, I can't see us getting anybody decent, and despite my misgivings, I do think he is still the right man for us, if only he wouldn't be so stubborn with his team selections.
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