43 mins: It is Palace who finish this half stronger, even if the guests lack a bit of width.

41 mins: Yellow card for Kamada who pulls Aina back.

One of my current favorite statistics is that Kamada has only played for clubs (or his country Japan) that have a bird as a crest/badge:

Sagan Tosu, Eintracht Frankfurt, Sint-Truidense VV, Lazio and Palace.

38 minutes: Suddenly the game screams for half-time.

“Perhaps panicked mega-stupid spending is actually the way to go because Forest have somehow managed to carve out a decent team with a decent manager out of this mess,” writes Edan Tal via email. “I always thought it would be a good idea to keep the team that got promoted, but now I’m leaning towards a complete reinvention.”

35 minutes: The game has lost some of its fluidity. A few fouls and bad passes.

32 mins: A third of the game is over. Forest overshadowed it but Eze and Nketiah showed enough to worry the home side.

29 mins: What a player Murillo is at centre-back for Forest. Reads the game beautifully, is quick, strong and has a nasty eye for a pass. There have already been four out of five moments in this game that could end up in a YouTube video titled ‘Murillo: Nottingham Forest 2024-25 highlights | HD’.

27 mins: “Re The Geordie Maradona,” writes Elliot Anderson’s Richard Woods via email, “we saw a fair amount of dribbling like this in the meme when Billy Elliott was on loan at Gas (Bristol Rovers).” Get in on the fun imagine the second division defenders had trying to deal with him? They say you should never fall in love with a loanee player. But it was really hard not to love him.”

I wasn’t aware of this loan spell, but I can imagine a decent return of eight goals in 21 appearances for Anderson in 2022, when he was still a teenager.

25 minutes: Nketiah comes free on the left but grabs a shot from a tight angle. The former Arsenal player is clearly desperate to score his first Premier League goal for Palace.

23 mins: It looks like Yates fell awkwardly while scrambling for a header. But to the cheers of the home fans, the fan favorite is back on his feet. He’ll be okay to move on.

22 mins: What kind of game is this! Now it’s Forest who hits the post! After a corner, the ball is cleared before hopefully making its way back into Palace’s penalty area. Yates rises highest at the back post and heads towards goal. The ball bounces awkwardly in front of Henderson and hits the far post before Mitchell clears for Palace! That could have gone in easily.

19 mins: Palace came back to counterattack. Similar to Eze in the first few minutes, Nketiah finds space between Forest’s midfield and defense and drives forward safely. Nketiah has options left and right but surprisingly lets go and catches Sels cold. The shot circles treacherously away from the Forest keeper and just hits the outside of the post. So close!

17 mins: Two great chances for Chris Wood! The striker is initially blocked by the goal line at the very last minute after a corner at the back post and parried by Munoz. The ball is recycled, Anderson picks up the ball from wide space and in the blink of an eye delivers a Beckham-esque deep cross for Wood, who heads the ball past the goal. Oooooh, you’d expect him to take that, but the New Zealander mistimed his diving header.

15 minutes: Anderson with some quick feet that would make Di Maria blush! The former Newcastle man twice dances through Palace tackles, the latter expertly getting past Munoz and Hughes before forcing Henderson into a save. Wow, I haven’t seen dribbling like that in a long time.

13 mins: Of course, the moment I say that, Hudson-Odoi breaks a tackle and gets to the byline, but his cutback to Yates comes just behind the midfielder and the move comes to nothing. Hudson-Odoi may have been offside, but that was better from Forest.

12 minutes: First real possession for Forest, which produced nothing special.

9min: Kamada is next to try his luck from distance, but the Japanese loses his balance as he strikes and it’s a tame attempt. Yates and Dominguez, Forest’s two sitting midfielders, are struggling to cope with Palace’s two attacking players, Eze and Kamada.

6 minutes: An early yellow card for Lerma who pushed Elanga back. It’s a frustrating yellow card for Palace’s combative midfielder, who now has to be careful of his approach.

5 minutes: Near Eze! The England international cuts in from the right and shoots straight towards the goal. Milenkovic retreats to his 18-yard penalty area without reaching out to the Palace man, who passes the ball and shoots just wide of the top corner! Ooooooooo, that was close. Sels stopped dead in his tracks and breathed a sigh of relief when he saw the ball fly just past the post.

2 minutes: Aina at right-back is a nice little player for Forest. He is also lightning quick and will have to deal with the dual threat of Kamada as a floating playmaker right inside him and Mitchell, who will look to push up from left wing-back.

Peeeeeep! And here we go. Forest in the famous red and white, Palace all in yellow.

The teams are out! It will be interesting to see the reception Dean Henderson gets in goal tonight. A few seasons ago he was on loan at Forest.

Forest look like they will line up in a 4-2-3-1. It will be interesting to see who represents Gibbs-White in the No. 10 role. Both Anderson (who serves as a sort of Scott McTominay-style all-action playmaker) and Dominguez are capable of playing there.

Nuno speaks:

We are missing a few players, but the squad is ready to play. Palace are a strong team. I don’t see any positives about being in the stands (at this game). I will communicate with my employees.

Interesting to see Nketiah starting ahead of Matetawho was on fire for Palace at the end of last season and was one of the players of the tournament for France at the Olympics in the summer, but is already looking tired… and it’s October. Nketiah has often (and perhaps somewhat surprisingly) been deployed as a winger but will get his chance at center tonight.

Forest have a physically strong duo in Milenkovic and Murillo who would have expected a fight with Mateta. Nketiah will be hoping to drop deep, drag Milenkovic and Murillo out of position and then find some space in the box to instinctively finish.

The teams!

preamble