Nottingham Forest’s first European adventure for almost 30 years was supposed to be a hoot but the mood music to a slender defeat in Braga felt rather alarming. The fact is Forest failed to perform and a stale display was typified by the chain of errors that culminated in the captain, Ryan Yates, scoring an own goal that proved sufficient to earn Braga victory. A section of away fans who made the trip to northern Portugal made their feelings plain to Sean Dyche, jeering their players on several occasions and on another singing: “Sideways and backwards, everywhere we go.”
Kick-off at this striking stadium felt a landmark achievement in itself given the biblical rainstorms in the hours before the game, with some of the 2,100 away supporters beginning to fret the main event of their final league-phase trip may not actually take place. But the ominous weather subsided and a formal pre-match pitch inspection was not required. Even Dyche ditched the shorts in favour of a full Forest tracksuit. Forest supporters again travelled in their numbers, hundreds without tickets, and they came hoping this would not be their final European trip of the season.
Forest made seven changes from their encouraging 0-0 draw against Arsenal last weekend and the obvious weakness was in attack. Igor Jesus did not travel to Portugal with his teammates after picking up a knock in training, leaving Forest without an orthodox striker after allowing Arnaud Kalimuendo to depart on loan for Eintracht Frankfurt, while Chris Wood is sidelined after knee surgery and Taiwo Awoniyi ineligible. Forest are pushing through a move for the Napoli forward Lorenzo Lucca, who flew into England on Thursday to finalise a loan switch.
So on a heavy pitch it was down to Dan Ndoye, a winger, to spearhead Forest’s attack and in an underwhelming opening period their lack of cutting edge was painfully apparent. Forest noticed the ball was stalling on the surface and the visitors were anything but smooth. Sikou Niakaté was booked for a crude block on Morgan Gibbs-White that gave the Forest No 10 a chance to take aim from a free-kick on the edge of the Braga 18-yard box. Lukas Hornicek made a save down to his right. The big chance in the first half fell to the hosts, Gabriel Martínez heading wide Víctor Gómez’s cross after beating the Forest right-back Nicolò Savona to the punch close to the penalty spot.
Dyche acknowledged this could be a sapping experience against a Braga side above them in the competition and with a manager who is a disciple of Pep Guardiola, having worked with him at Manchester City. “We know it is a challenging place to come to, well coached I’m sure, by someone who worked under Pep in his first real managerial role and going well in the Europa League,” the Forest head coach said.
Forest struggled to create chances but five minutes into the second half James McAtee went down in the box under pressure from Martínez and the Croatian referee, Igor Pajac, pointed to the penalty spot. There was a lengthy video assistant referee check and almost three minutes had passed by the time Gibbs-White stepped up to take the spot-kick. His right-footed penalty lacked conviction, Hornicek read the plan and the goalkeeper dived low to his left to push the ball away from his goal with his left hand.
Gibbs-White grimaced, Hornicek beamed. Braga flew forward on the counterattack and less than a minute later the ball was in the back of Matz Sels’s net. Yates wore a look of disbelief after inadvertently diverting Ricardo Horta’s squared ball into the net. Yates’s desperate attempt to clear went against him but his was not the only error in a comedic goal from a Forest perspective, Yates skidding into the netting as the ball bobbled away from him in slow motion.
Just after the hour Ola Aina, who started at left-back with Savona on the opposite flank, rattled the crossbar with a speculative, swerving effort from 30 yards but that in itself spoke volumes. Forest lacked invention and quickly tired of ideas. Worse still, Dyche’s side looked susceptible to conceding again. The Braga substitute Pau Víctor sent an effort against the inside of a post and another substitute, João Moutinho, went close. Yates tried to direct a header goalwards after Hornicek denied Ndoye but it was all too little too late. To compound Forest’s misery, Elliot Anderson was shown a red card in stoppage time for appearing to say something to the officials.
