Forest fans furious

Wednesday, 01/09/2010

by Shoot's Nottingham Forest blogger, Jonathan Hill

If anyone has paid attention to anything Forest have done in the past… well… ever, actually, they’ll have noticed that we rarely do business during the January transfer window.

In the summer, however, it’s normally a different story. Last year saw countless players come in during the close season but this year there’s been nothing – nothing at all except for the loan signing of Ryan Bertrand from Chelsea.

Let me put it into context for anyone who is unsure of why I’m complaining. Yes, we finished third last season. Yes, we were unbeaten away from home for God knows how long and yes, our home form was pretty decent too. But, we had a threadbare squad and managed to achieve what we did against all odds.

This time around we’ve got even fewer players. James Perch, Joe Garner, Paul Smith and George Boyd have all gone and we’re currently looking at a matchday squad which picks itself due to no other players actually being at Billy Davies’ disposal.

If you’ve read my previous blogs, you’ll know that our Chief Executive, Mark Arthur, spoke live on Radio Nottingham about how Peter Whittingham and Darren Pratley wanted to sign for the club, yet here I sit, at 6.37pm on 31^st August, and no players have signed.

I hate the term 'knee-jerk reaction' and so I’m attempting to avoid making one, but surely Arthur should resign now. We were accused of tapping-up Whittingham and Pratley and we quite spectacularly failed. I’d like to say I’ll eat my words if it turns out a deal was done and it’s being kept quiet, but that’s about as likely as The Beatles reforming for a comeback tour so I won’t hold my breath.

Frankly, I’m disappointed. I don’t want to get too worked-up about it because we’ve still got a decent side, but it’s quite obvious we’re not going to scale the heights of last season without strengthening as our squad is now weaker than those around us.

It looks as though the men in charge at the City Ground are happy for us to become another Coventry – hovering around mid-table in the Championship year-on-year, often flirting with relegation.

That’s not good enough for me. And it’s not good enough for the thousands of loyal Forest supporters who follow the team home and away.

I’m looking forward to – in a slightly twisted way – the reaction at the Millwall game after the international break. I definitely expect there to be some sort of backlash.

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