It really was a fantastic afternoon for everyone of a Forest persuasion, in particular for Robbie Earnshaw who scored a superb hat trick – his first for the Club – to give us a well-deserved three-nil lead. All three goals were taken really well, and it was brilliant to see him back to doing what he does best. It's hard to believe that little over a month ago, there was strong talk of him leaving the Club as he was struggling with injuries and lack of form, but since he returned to fitness, he has fought his way back into Billy Davies' good books, scoring five goals in the past three games. You really cannot ask for more than that, and now he must surely start every game. Before it was all about Dexter Blackstock, but Earnshaw is the one everybody is talking about again now, and I couldn't be more delighted for him, because he is such a nice person, and clearly loves playing for Forest.
While Forest fans play down the rivalry with the Foxes, insisting that 'we only hate Derby', for Leicester-born Paul Anderson, it was in his own words 'the biggest game of his career so far'. He said in a pre-match interview how desperate he was to score a goal, and when he struck the fourth goal magnificently from 20 yards out, he celebrated as if he had won us a cup or something! When he was interviewed after the game, he said it was the best day of his life so far! That's what scoring in front of 4,000+ Leicester fans, some of whom he knows personally and gets frequent stick from, meant to him, and I was really happy for him that his dream of scoring came true. It was bound to really, wasn't it?!
I never relax when we are three goals up, but once Anderson got the fourth, I felt sure we had secured the three points as Leicester were awful and had showed no sign of getting back into it. A little bit of doubt crept back into my mind, however, when they scored from a penalty with 25 minutes left to give themsleves a glimmer of hope, but when substitute Dele Adebola scored a fifth, even I, one of the biggest hypochondriacs you're likely to meet, was convinced that we'd won the game.
We are now flying high in third place in the table, having swapped places with Leicester, who slip into fourth as a result of the hammering we inflicted on them. I am not surprised to see us doing so well. We have a really good team now and in my opinion, the best manager in the Championship. Our confidence is absolutely full to the brim at the moment, and if I was a neutral, I would say Forest were definite automatic promotion contenders. It's very exciting to think that by the time the trip to West Brom comes around in a month's time, we could potentially go second if we beat them – that's if we're not already there, that is!
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