Nottingham Forest continue to struggle to find any sort of form in the Sky Bet Championship this season as they drew 1-1 at home to Charlton Athletic at The City Ground. Callum Harriot's deflected strike off Michael Mancienne had given Charlton the lead early on, but was cancelled out in the second half by a wonder strike from Robert Tesche which prevented Charlton from taking home all three points.
The game started pretty slowly and scrappy as both sides attempted to get a foothold in the game. Henri Lansbury picked up his 9th yellow card of this season for a blatant foul on Cousins. This seems to be a new part of his game this season where if the game isn't going his way he just lashes out and picks up needless yellow cards. Due to Forest's form this season, this seems to be happening every game and it won't be long until he is suspended again. Chartlon then took the lead in the 9th minute as Callum Harriot's volley took a deflection off Michael Mancienne's leg which took it past Karl Darlow into the bottom corner. This was proving to be a very, very poor first half performance from Forest as the team provided little to get the crowd going. It could have been 2-0 to Charlton as a great cross opened up the Forest defence but Vetokele could only head the ball at Karl Darlow in the Forest goal. You would of put your house on Vetokele converting that sort of chance with the form he has been showing so far this season. Michail Antonio was looking the only threat for Forest, in what was arguably one of his best personal performances over 90 minutes. He combined well with Lansbury to give him a good chance but his shot was straight at the goalkeeper.
Stuart Pearce decided to make a change at half time with Robert Tesche replacing Henri Lansbury. This seemed a wise move as Lansbury wasn't playing very well, and looked in massive danger of being sent off having already picked up a yellow card. Jamie Paterson could have won a penalty early in the second half as his turn caused the Charlton defence problems and he appeared to have been brought down but the referee didn't give it. Watching it back, I believe this was a definite penalty. Tesche didn't take long to make an impact in the game as in the 59th minute he scored what will be one of the goals of the season. He took the ball down on his chest and volleyed home from long range. His celebration was just as good as he did a couple of flips to celebrate drawing Forest level. Forest were performing much better in the second half and Jamie Paterson came close to putting Forest 2-1 ahead as his shot went just wide of the post. Dexter Blackstock came on in the 76th minute for a rare appearance which have been limited so far this season. Forest piled on the pressure in the last 15 minutes but just couldn't find that elusive second goal to win them the match.
Overall, this was a very strange game from Forest's point of view. The first half was probably the worst performance from Forest so far this season and the second was a much improved performance and Forest maybe in the end deserved to win the game. However, Forest cannot continue to play so poorly in the first half of games, we have to start well to give ourselves a good chance of winning. You are always going to be struggling to win games when you play so poorly for half the match. I am sure this is what Stuart Pearce will be looking to improve on, in the upcoming trip to Rotherham United.
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