Forest don't need world beaters, just bodies

Losing a home game is always a very unpleasant feeling, but when it's happened for the first time in 18 months, it leaves you feeling a bit shell-shocked.

All I've heard since yesterday's match is: 'Well, it had to happen sometime.' Er, no it didn't, especially not against Hull City of all teams. Forest could have gone on and maintained their unbeaten record at home for the rest of the season quite easily. But they've lost their way a lot recently, and they've gone from winning six in a row to winning just one in seven. I'm beginning to think that there may be some truth in the belief that the Manager of the Month Award is a curse.

In terms of the League Table, the defeat didn't cause us much harm at all as there were poor results for the other sides with Norwich being held at home to Preston, Swansea losing at Scunthorpe, and Cardiff slipping up at home with a defeat against Ipswich. But, to be honest, even though we still remain just three points away from second place, does anyone seriously think we are going up automatically now, given the state we are in at the moment? The players look exhausted and they are picking up niggling injuries because of this. Sadly I don't think this is a bad patch that we're going through, but more likely a permanent decline as the season winds down to its inevitable conclusion: That is we will still be a Championship side next season.

It's a bit telling that this week Billy Davies said in an interview that if promotion is not delivered this season, then we'll go for it next time. It sounds like an admission that the squad is not good enough, and that Nigel Doughty has told him that he is not willing to back him. We've been fobbed off with the excuse that we can't make loan signings because all the good players are not available at such a crucial time of the season. So how come the other teams are bringing in people? Even if the players are not world beaters, having a few new faces in the dressing room does give the other players a big boost, but the short-sighted Mark Arthur believes that we shouldn't be bringing in players who are not better than what we've already got. Keep on believing that, Arthur, and things will never change.