'Needed to improve': Nuno shares what Nottingham Forest have spent 'hours' on in training
Yesterday at 04:00 PM
Nottingham Forest have made great strides on the pitch this season with Nuno Espirito Santo reaping the rewards of some meticulous training ground methods.
The Forest head coach was given a full pre-season to get things right at Forest after a somewhat indifferent start to life on Trentside.
Evangelos Marinakis considered sacking Espirito Santo twice last season but now he’s being repaid for showing such loyalty to his head coach.
Forest are currently fifth in the Premier League table and go to Arsenal on Saturday looking to put more points on the board in North London.
A large contribution to the brilliant start made by Forest has been the solid defensive performances – led largely by the arrival of Nikola Milenkovic.
The training methods have played a part though and Espirito Santo has discussed one key aspect he was keen to work on this summer.
Nuno Espirito Santo shares what his team have spent ‘hours’ on in training
Last season was a real struggle defensively for Forest and in particular when it came to keeping out set pieces.
Only Burnley were worse in those situations than Forest and the Clarets were ultimately relegated at the end of the campaign.
This season, Forest went 10 matches without conceding from a set-piece with Newcastle breaching that resolve for the first time before the international break.
Espirito Santo has admitted that it’s of testament to his players that Forest have kicked on when it comes to defending set pieces.
He told his press conference earlier today: “The first step was the awareness of the players that understand that we needed to improve on that aspect and their involvement was massive, they put some effort on that – many hours on the training ground.
“The last game was not so good but the effort is with the players and they deserve credit. We have someone inside because it’s all of the coaching staff’s responsibility.”
Forest now look comfortable defensively
Naturally, there will be occasions when the Forest rearguard is breached, especially give the nature of the Premier League.
The challenge for Forest is to make those occasions rarer than they were last season when the team’s ability to defend set pieces became comical at times.
Espirito Santo has clearly worked on things behind the scenes and the soft underbelly does appear to have evaporated somewhat during the current campaign.
With a settled back five currently in operation, Forest look to have nailed a winning formula and the challenge now is to get as many points on the board as quickly as possible.
With the defence currently performing beyond expectations, hopefully, more positive results can be obtained in the coming weeks.
