Pope John XXIII - 3/3/2018 18:00
That was a poor performance but a great result. No getting around it, forest were poor. I didn't enjoy the game really, we entertained very infrequently and there were big deficiencies.
First half was particularly poor. The attacking 4 were lacklustre. We spent a lot of time passing around the back because Birmingham kept midfield tight and there wasnt the movement from the attacking players for us to pick anyone out. The goal was a great move but that and a few blocked chances aside was it. Birmingham had better chances first half and Osborn was appalling at left back, getting absolutely roasted by Maghoma and barely helping with attack.
Second half we were better but hardly effervescent. We had more chances than them deserved our second goal. Osborn improved significantly and I believe it was his superb cross field pass that picked Cash out. Guedioura's energy made a real difference when he came on.
At that point we looked great and Osborn really should have scored a third with the goal at his mercy.
They got a corner that looked dubious and scored an appalling goal from our point of view- ball came in and Morrison headed it in with no resistance from our defenders.
You always fear a scrambled goal after that but in the end there were no really scary moments. I thought Pantillimon was excellent.
It wasn't a great game. Birmingham played well and weren't half as bad as I anticipated. We were very off today and for fans the cold was bloody horrible. But we ground out a win. Thats probably the most important take away from this game- we won a game we weren't great in.
The scoreline was probably fair. They did enough to score and over the 90 we did enough to win.
