Nottingham Forest To Play Arsenal

illustration: Natalie Owen

Sometimes football has a funny way of reminding you of your standing in the game. For a team like Derby, when they drew Liverpool in the cup it becomes cause for celebration, a reason for them to imagine what life would be like in the big time. For us, a home draw to Arsenal, as good as it may be for ticket sales, becomes a reminder that we used to be the ‘big name’ in just about every cup draw. A team like Arsenal would fear us, now they’ll play their kids.

That they will play their kids may not be a bad thing, it could be a real test for us, and a test to see just how far we’ve come in the short time that Montanier has been at the club.

It would be easy to get too into the possibilities given where both team currently are, but if, like me, you remember a time when we would play Arsenal a couple of times each season then it’s nice to think back to those days.

I remember our last meeting, in January 1999, a 0-1 defeat at home more remembered for Ron Atkinson deciding he would prefer the Arsenal job and mistakenly taking his seat in their dugout. Looking at an Arsenal blog from the time they led with this team news for us ‘Steve Stone suspended. Good’. I wonder if we currently have any players for a suspension would bring relief to our illustrious opposition!

The stats, for any meaning you can attach to them, signal a close match. 46 meetings between the two teams at the City Ground have resulted in 8 draws and 19 wins a piece. Forest edge the goals, scoring 61 to Arsenal’s 58 in those games. Maybe Arsenal can remember who gave them their famous red colours (hint: we did, by generously sending them some old kit – although nowadays we’d be flogging it off for £20 a shirt in the club shop sale), and at least give us a chance.

For the younger fans this will no doubt be an occasion to savour. The consequence of our league position since our last game against Arsenal is that anyone 17 or younger will have not been born the last time we played, indeed anyone under the age of 25/26 are unlikely to have ever see us play Arsenal. The result is that, with this game, we are fully enshrined as the minnows. A bitter pill to swallow for those of us with longer memories, but a result in this game will be labelled as an upset.

Still, it’s something to look forward to, not least to see how well we managed to develop Chuba Akpom. If this is all too doom and gloom, let’s just remember how we beat Man City only a few years ago.

More by Richard Crouch