Charlton Athletic have been one of the surprise packages of the season so far. They were predicted by many people to have a season of struggle after just staying up in the Championship last season. New manager Bob Peeters probably wasn't expected to do anymore than keep Charlton in the Championship this season, but so far they are massively exceeding these expectations currently sitting 10th in the league. However, Charlton's results have dropped off recently, after the almost faultless start they made to the campaign. They have only won once in their last six matches, this being a 1-0 win away at Reading. Vetokele is a player Forest will have to look out for as he has been in fantastic form so far this season and has been the key reason in their very respectable league position. Most recently, Charlton lost 1-0 at home to Ipswich in what was a very scrappy affair, settled by a late strike from Ipswich debutant Noel Hunt. Charlton will consider themselves unlucky to lose this match and will be looking to bounce back at the City Ground this weekend. In comparison, Forest suffered a very disappointing and controversial defeat to Birmingham City last weekend. A late controversial penalty was given to Birmingham City and was converted to consolidate Forest to a 2-1 defeat. However, Forest cannot be too disheartened by this result after two impressive wins against Norwich City and Wolverhampton Wanderers. If Forest can recreate the performance they produced at Wolves they have a great chance of beating any team in this division. However, Forest's form overall in the past few months has been very poor with only two wins in twelve games. This is not good enough for promotion which is what Forest are hoping to achieve this season.
The Forest player's dispute with the referee after the fourth official influences the referee to give a penalty in the 2-1 defeat to Birmingham City.
There are no new injury concerns ahead of the visit of Charlton Athletic on Saturday. The only forced absentee is Britt Assombalonga who is serving his one match ban after getting sent off for handball last weekend against Birmingham City. Apart from that there are no other new injuries to note. Andy Reid and Jack Hobbs are said to be progressing well with their long term injuries so they will hopefully be back around the back end of the festive period. The only other long term injury is Chris Cohen who will miss the rest of the season through injury.
My prediction for this game is Nottingham Forest 1-0 Charlton Athletic. I think it will be a very tight scrappy win for Forest. This is the sort of game Forest always struggle in when we have to take the game to the opposition. Charlton are also a very solid outfit and won't be easy to breakdown especially now we are missing the pace of Britt Assombalonga. I fancy Dexter Blackstock to get his first start of the season and maybe even nick a goal. I would take this kind of win just to keep spirits high before the run of festive fixtures coming up.
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