Nottingham Forest (Away) 14.12.2025

Four minutes into the match and Tottenham should have been behind when Savona crossed from the right and Sangare met the ball with his head and the ball crashed out off Vicario’s right hand post.  The ball bobbled about the box before Williams struck a shot from around the penalty spot that Vic had to dive to his left to push away.

It took 14 minutes for Spurs to have an attempt on goal, with Randal Kolo Muani’s cross weakly headed wide by Richarlison as Tottenham struggled to put a move together.  The game had little flow, as there were a number of stoppages for free-kicks.  The criticism that Spurs are to passive seemed to be having some substance, as Forest made all the running, which we didn’t match.  There was an incident in the 20th minute, when Xavi made a run forward off the ball  and Murillo looked to stop his run by putting his body in the way, with Xavi catching his head on the Forest defender’s shoulder, but after a talking to for both players, play continued.  

Milenkovic headed wide a Williams cross in the 24th minute and then the Forest man was at the other end, hauling Richi down with both hands tugging him over by his shirt, but referee Borratt lived up to his usual standard of refereeing but not awarding a free-kick.  It is truly appalling the level of refereeing in the Premier League this season.  Dead on 28 minutes, Forest took the lead when a long ball upfield was knocked back to Vicario, who passed it out to the edge of the box for Archie Gray, who had made a run to receive it.  Cristian Romero was available to his left and a first-time pass might have found him, but taking a touch allowed Sangare to pinch the ball off him and square it to Hudson-Odoi, by-passing Vicario in the process and the Forest striker had a simple task to putting the ball into an empty net.  It is not enough to pass to a player who wants the ball, but the pressure on him should be seen before the pass is played.  Yes, it is the way to break a press, but only if options are available and usually more than one would be good.

Tottenham moved the ball up the right and Savona was booked for a sliding tackle on Djed Spence that got nowhere near the ball and from the free-kick, the Forest keeper Victor had to push Porro’s in-swinging effort over the bar.  The same player took the corner and it was punched out from under the bar by the goalie.  It was a little spell of pressure that ended with Archie Gray pulling out a save from the keeper when he turned on a volley from just inside the box.  Spurs got caught on the break in the 37th minute when Jesus put in a low cross from the right and it just evaded Gibbs-White at the far post.

Archie got booked for catching Williams after he played the ball away and the referee was being strongly influenced by the crowd, as Anderson did the same to Micky van de Ven, with no card and then he ran into Porro after the ball had gone off provoking a response from the Spurs defender.  The confrontation also brought a booking apiece for the two team’s coaching staff, with possibly Matt Wells seeing yellow for Spurs.  When Murillo then brought down Richarlison as he ran the ball away from the Spurs box and then kicked the ball away, he also was not booked when they were all similar fouls to the one the ref had given a booking for to Gray.  The constant howling for decisions when they didn’t go Forest’s way was looking like it was affecting the officials’ decision-making and it was clear that the pressure was being put on him when the red shirts confronted him when he blew for half-time, for no apparent reason.

The second half kicked off with the crowd noisy after their players were tackled cleanly, but when the ball went left to Hudson-Odoi, he shaped to go to the dead-ball line, turned back and from wide of the box curled a shot beyond Vicario to make it 2-0.  It was a cross intended to pick out Jesus at the far post, but it ended up beating the Spurs keeper.

Tottenham suddenly looked like they wanted to speed things up, but at 0-2 it was all a little too late, as not competing with the Forest endeavour had allowed the home team to dominate and the lack of attacking intent left us chasing the game that had got away from us.  A triple sub of Ben Davies, Lucas Bergvall and Joao Palhinha for Gray, Bentancur and Spence, who didn’t look happy and applauded the whole ground as he got clapping from the Forest fans for his time there when they were promoted.  The changes didn’t make much immediate impact with Jesus flashing a shot across goal from the edge of the box, then Hutchinson did the same from just left of centre outside the box.

For a team that were beaten 3-0 by Everton last week, Spurs were doing a good job of making them look like world-beaters.  Lucas took a yellow card when he knocked Hudson-Odoi off the ball as the winger looked to move into the Spurs half with the ball.  Murillo wrestled Richarlison to the ground with no intent of going for the ball, but that wasn’t a booking in the referee’s eyes. 

When the third goal went in, the Spurs section was already missing some fans and started to empty a bit quicker.  With Brennan Johnson and Mathys Tel waiting to come on, Forest moved the ball from halfway to the midfielder Sangare, who struck a fine shot out of Vicario’s reach and went in off his left-hand post from 20 yards out.  There wasn’t much Vic could do about this one, but the defence failed to close down the scorer, much as happened at home to Villa a few weeks back, when two goals from outside the box flew in.

To hear the olés sounding with every successful pass it was increasingly frustrating as a Tottenham supporter and it proved to be too much for Pedro Porro, who dragged Williams back by the neck following a long string of passes that earned him a yellow card.  Things weren’t helped by giving the ball away time after time and then a late free-kick on the edge of the box for a foul by Palhinha allowed Forest another pop at goal, which Gibbs-White took.  Vicario pushed it away to Hutchinson, whose weak shot was got behind by the Spurs keeper.

Tel did well to win a corner which found Richarlison deep in the box, but his header was blocked and the game got played out at the Spurs end until the final whistle.

This match was a complete contrast to the last two when Spurs were energetic and were closing down players to force errors.  It was the other way around, with Forest more determined to shut Tottenham players down and to find space off the ball.  Too often, Kolo Muani and Simons found themselves defending deep in the Tottenham half, which is good to see, but that left nobody up front as an out ball.  Not having a target man to hold the ball up, Spurs suffer from being unable to keep the ball high up the pitch.  Richi runs to close defenders down a lot, but his first touch is usually poor and the ball is lost. 

It was all too easy and that is what really rankles with Spurs fans.  If things aren’t going well then graft and show passion, as that is the very least that can be asked for.  Free scarves for every Tottenham supporter who went to the game was a nice gesture, but it back-fired with the team putting in a performance that is a shadow of what they can do.  Losing should be something that the team hates as much as the fans and the disconnect within the team was just as it appeared against the Gooners.  Losing matches happens but it is the nature of the way you lose that sometimes tells more about the team.

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