A game where both sides seemed determined to gif tthe other goals.
At times Saints played the best football of their season against Forest, at others especially defensively they were woeful.
Nigel Adkins selections were a little baffling to say the least as he opted to change 75% of his back four from the side that started at Leicester, it was no surprise that Danny Fox came in for Dan Harding but if dropping Fraser Richardson wasnt wholly unexpected, replacing him with Jack Cork and not Danny Butterfield was, Jos Hooiveld also being preferred to Arron martin to partner Jose Fonte. Even more strange was the fact that neither Richardson, Harding or even Butterfield appeared on the bench, however Ryan Dickson did a man who seemed to have disapeared from view so far this season.
Early on it was all Saints so it was a shock when the visitors took the lead, carving Saints open on our right leeaving Derbyshire with an easy tap in, the lead lasted barely a minute though, Guly superbly taking a couple of touched and playing in Connolly and although Camp in the Forest goal blocked the rebound sat up nicely for Lambert.
The second was another well worked goal, Connoly crossing and Lambert steaming in at the far post to head home the flicked on cross, at this stage it looked like Saints would win handsomely.
But just before the break Forest again passed right through the Saints defence and in a copy of the first goal Majewski had another simple tap in from an unselfish pass.
Saints almost again scored a minute later when Lambert was given the ball by a Forest defender and put Connolly through, Camp again made a great save, this time however the rebound went a fair distance from any Saints player to take advantage, at the break Saints really should have gone in ahead and you thought it might be the same old story of two lapses in concentration costing Saints dearly.
The second half was open and Saints had their chances, but they almost gifted Forest a third when Davis put Fox under unneccesary pressure, the left back did the safe thing and returned the ball to Davis, strangely though the keeper didnt do the basic thing and clear his lines as most in the ground thought he would, but instead seemed to try and dribble it round Derbyshire who blocked the ball, a tussle ensued and Saints hearts were in their mouths as the linesman flagged, but his verdict was that Derbyshire had dived and hadnt been fouled and the decision went Saints way.
Moments later the game turned, Fox went over to the right and took an inswinging free kick from way out, the ball was a peach and Lambert was there to head home from close range.
Saints were good value for their win, although as mentioned at times they seemed determined to throw it all away, the two men in for their first start in the main had solid games, first half Hooiveld looked solid, second less so, but that could be due to this being his first game in a while and a lack of match fitness rather than anything else.
Fox to be blunt showed why we bought him, he defended how a full back should defend, held his line well and as his free kick showed, he delivered balls in that caused problems to the opposing defence rather than the crowd behind the goal, not to mention the ball boys ears, all of whom Im sure where grateful to see him rather than Harding.
This was a good win, there were still a few things that need tweaking, but at the end of the day despite the problems we still took three points from the game and kept up our challenge at the top and thats what matters most, if we still win in games like this then that bodes well for the future when we do get things 100% right, but we do need to erase all these little errors in defence out of our game.