Though the results haven’t been there so far, there is supreme confidence within Nottingham Forest’s playing group that they are headed in the right direction under Ange Postecoglou.
England international Morgan Gibbs-White spoke in the official pre-match press conference and gave a glowing review of their new manager:
This is what comes with trying to get to the top. You’re always going to have blips, but when we get that first win we’ll be unstoppable.
The manager has taken well to the group we’ve taken well to him. We believe in him and his ideas. He’s well respected within the group and I think you can see how we’re playing out there.
The way that we’re playing and the way that we’re understanding each other, because of the manager’s ideas, has shown so much in recent games. It’s just we’re missing that final cutting edge. If we had won all these games — which I personally think we should have — then everyone would be raving about Ange. Everyone would be absolutely excited. That would be the type of discussion.
But we’re just waiting for that win. And I think as soon as that comes, we’ll start to kick on.
Morgan Gibbs-White.Credit: Getty Images
As Postecoglou himself noted, of course a player is only going to speak publicly in positive terms about their boss – but from his perspective, Forest have been “dominating every aspect” except on the scoreboard:
I think [a win] would be helpful, but for me it’s about the players. They’ve embraced what we are trying to do. Since I’ve come in we are doing things differently, and the players have bought into it.
But I want them to get the rewards for it a well. They are working awfully hard, in every physical metric we have they are producing their best performances.
We are creating more chances than the opposition, dominating in every aspect, but we aren’t winning. We want the players to feel the reward of that, because it accelerates growth and belief. It’s not about going away from what we’ve been doing, that’s for sure.
