Poor Nottingham Forest. And, especially, poor Nikola Milenkovic. It would be unfair to say Brentford fluked a win in the 100th Premier League game here, but Forest had 15 shots to their six and have every right to wonder why luck has deserted them so absolutely this season.
Only one of Brentford’s goals went down as an own-goal, but both went in after hefty deflections off Milenkovic. A sixth successive defeat for Forest in games played on Halloween must have them wondering about curses and an inexplicable run of misfortune.
For both sides there has been a sense things might have been better than the table suggests. No side has underperformed their xG as significantly as Forest, who went into the weekend third in Opta’s expected table, but third-bottom in real life. Part of their issue has been the form of Liam Delap, who arrived in the summer from Chelsea for £50m, but has scored once. The 23-year-old is beginning to look like another victim of Chelsea’s trading model. Confidence shot, the purposeful striker of his Ipswich days has become a mess of flailing arms and wild finishing. By the time he was withdrawn 20 minutes into the second half, Delap had three shots, none on target.
Delap was not the only culprit. Ryan Yates, having come off the bench at half-time, headed an extremely presentable opportunity over. None of Morgan Gibbs-White’s three efforts were on target. The closest Forest came was James McAtee’s first-half effort, drifting in from the right, only for Caoimhín Kelleher to save his curled effort.
No Premier League side has scored fewer goals than Forest this season. The big problem is that missing chances can become a habit. A lack of belief in front of goal can become self-perpetuating and it was evident in the second half that, even as Forest enjoyed significant territorial advantage, there was a frenzied, over-anxious edge to much of their attacking play. Again and again the ball would be delivered into the area only for a clumsy barge or foul to lift the pressure.
At other clubs, it might be assumed that consistent performances, even if results are struggling to catch up, would sustain a manager. Oliver Glasner has a fine track record and, chance conversion aside, has not done much wrong at Forest. But Forest’s owner, Evangelos Marinakis, is notoriously impatient. Good underlying numbers are not likely to stay his trigger finger for long.
Brentford’s case is less extreme, but there is something baffling in that this was their first win since the 3-0 victory over Chelsea before the last international break. A run of 12 draws in their 18 Premier League games before this one speaks of a side that could easily be even better off than they already are with even slightly better finishing. That’s the Brentford conundrum: they are playing well, have a very good chance of qualifying for Europe for the first time and yet there has been a feeling they have been leaving points behind.
But who needs finishing when the opposition are as generous as this? For Forest, the opening goal followed a familiar pattern. It wasn’t quite like their previous away game, at Crystal Palace, when it felt an affront to the laws of the universe that they went in behind at half-time, but they had seemed comfortable when, on the half hour, Murillo misjudged a through-ball, setting Dango Ouattara free. The Burkina Faso forward’s cross then looped off Milenkovic and over a wrongfooted Matz Sels.
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Quick Guide
Brentford 2-0 Nottingham Forest key facts
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• Brentford have scored the opening goal in eight of their last nine Premier League games, and only Manchester City (37) and Arsenal (32) have done so more often in the competition since the start of last season than the Bees (27).
• Nottingham Forest have failed to score in five of their nine Premier League games this season, no side has done so more; that’s despite having more xG than their opponents in seven of those nine matches.
• Since the start of last season, only Erling Haaland (33), João Pedro (20) and Antoine Semenyo (18) have scored more non-penalty goals in the Premier League than the 16 of Igor Thiago (pictured). Opta
Mathias Jensen hit the bar with a first-half free-kick and if Brentford created little more than that they rarely seemed under much pressure. The second to settle the game came with 14 minutes remaining, Jaidon Anthony breaking down the right and crossing low for Igor Thiago, his finish deflecting in via the luckless Milenkovic and the underside of the bar.
It sounds facile to say that apart not scoring goals and they keep on helping the ball into their own net, Forest are fine, but it’s true. Unless morale disintegrates completely, they should be fine. The ball will start running for them. But for now the fates remain arrayed against them.
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