Forest are Reading and raring to go!

The new season is less than a week away now, and Forest look like they're in pretty good shape for the big kick-off against Reading on Saturday.

Robert Earnshaw's late strike against Premiership new boys Birmingham earned them a confidence-boosting victory at the City Ground at the weekend, and according to the man from Sky Sports News, they looked very impressive going forward. To be honest, I would expect nothing less with the amount of quality we have up front!

We've not had a bad pre-season really. If you forget the 2-1 defeat at Notts County, which was rather inevitable with all the crazy press coverage going on in the wake of Sven Goran Erikisson's shock appointment, we've done really well. In the past few years, Forest have usually been very lacklustre during pre-season, and as a result taken a while to get going once the campaign gets underway. But it looks as though they've had a really tough pre-season under Billy Davies, and hopefully this means that we will have an enjoyable autumn this year, and our season starts in August rather than in January.

This summer has been one of the best Forest have had in a long time, regarding transfers. No fewer than nine players have been brought in, eight of them permanently. The other, Polish winger Radoslaw Majewski, has signed on loan for the season, with the option of him joining long-term next year. Majewski looks quite a good prospect, and he has been starting every game so far in the friendlies, so Davies obviously is impressed with him. It took him just two minutes to score on his debut against Rushden and Diamonds last week. I think I'm going to have to learn how to say his name correctly, as I've got a feeling he's going to become something of a regular fixture in the team this season!

I haven't been this excited in years about Forest, and it's about time, too. We've been put through the emotional wringer over the past five years, but we've stuck by them in numbers. We deserve a bit of happiness for a change. Nobody's saying we're going to get promoted, but a top ten finish in the Championship would be something to build on for the season after.