F.A. Cup Glory

Well we all by now know the result and if you don't what rock were you hiding beneath for the last 24 hours, but a glorious televised 5-0 for Forest versus an admittedly under strength West Ham saw Forest sail through the Fourth Round.

Paterson

Forest saw the return of Moussi to the line up for Vaughan and Paterson of course in the team on the other flank to Abdoun for Mackie. Save for that the team was pretty much the same as played over Christmas. 

To say things started well is an understatement and from the off we looked the better team. We took a relatively early lead when Paterson was fouled in the area and Abdoun snatched the ball to take the penalty ahead of the likes of Reid and Lansbury who had scored penalties before this season.

Well I said to my friends when he stepped up that I was worried he'd try something stupid. He of course did. One assumes the keeper hadnt been aware of Abdoun or he might have guessed he'd try a "Panenka" penalty. It was almost predictable. Had it been saved he'd have looked monumentally stupid, instead he pulled it off and was acclaimed by some on the net as a genius.

The rest of the half was pretty much us having more of the ball and creating half chances, but the best other chance of the half fell to Ravel Morrison for West Ham whose free kick was well flicked over the bar by the hand of Darlow.

In the second half we overcame a dodgy period to go and complete the rout of West Ham. Jamie Paterson came of age on a Forest shirt with a hat trick of quality and a little bit of luck. His first was a low drilled shot into the corner from a Halford knock down, the second was deflected in from a defender into the bottom right corner, and his third and final goal he collected the ball out wide, ran across the edge of the area and finished into the corner again fora glorious hat trick.

Andy Reid finished the rout with a goal after a cut back from Abdoun and finished into the top of the net. This didn't flatter us at all. It was deserved and I felt sorry for the West Ham fans who must have started so early in the day to come up and watch something so abject. This lasted a short while. I know that when the tables are turned the sympathy is so slow in coming apart from the mocking. 

The attention is all more about Allardyce in today's media, will he hang on to his job after this? What does it mean for their transfer activity? It is less about what it means for Forest, or how good we are, but that's what gets the attention. Not the smaller club, but the Premiership sides travails.. That's the way of the world I guess.

Two Sides to Bakary Story

The Bakary Sako saga has been entertaining as it reached a close today with the new he won’t be leaving. What’s entertaining is the fall out on either side of the debate about this almost transfer.

Forest fans are aghast that a League One club is demanding such high fees for a player. This of course has its merits. It’s not like it'd be for a promising up and coming player either to embellish the fee. No he’s at his best right now. Wolves paid £3mill for him when as a Championship club entertaining notions of promotion to the Premier League, before plummeting through the Championship trap door. They apparently in the summer wanted to make a profit on him, which for me is a strange situation when they aren’t the same club with the same turnover as before. If the situation changes then surely the market rates do? Do I still think a house bought before the banking crisis is worth the same just because I think it is? No the market dictates value.

Wolves’ fans are suggesting we are stupid and mucking around and that if we really want him why not pay the price they are demanding or shut up. Which is a valid point if you just fail to ignore something called common sense.

Say I have an apple. It’ a very nice apple. Apples aren’t in season anymore and we wanted that apple at that time but decided not to pay the price for the apple. Apples have a value as does everything, and sometimes they go for more or less, but generally people what they think that apple is worth. The apple we wanted is now suddenly more expensive and they wanted an Orange in return for it too. Would you buy the apple? No. No-one would. It’s the same apple, nothing’s changed, just now they seem to think it is worth more because... well I’m not sure why.

It’s completely laughable and borderline retarded to say we clearly aren’t that rich if we are unwilling to spend a figure we deem too much for something. If you blindly just go and pay what a vendor demands for a price without first checking whether what you’re buying is worth it your stupid.

Wolves clearly think Sako is key to getting promote. And he must be if we want him, but a League One club valuing a player so highly? We aren’t poor because we refuse to pay too much for something. That’s such a stupid statement. I’m clearly poor because I’d refuse to pay £5 for a can of coke.

And now I get to frankly the most ridiculous part of this whole silly charade. Where each clubs fans start proclaiming each other’s clubs joke. Wolves fans (Wolves are in league One, that’s below the Championship) that they are better placed club for Sako and are a bigger club. That’s a kind of logic you don’t argue with, because the purveyor of it is as stupid as to not bother wasting your time on.

We aren’t blameless here of course. Forest fans have suggested Wolves are holding the player to ransom. Wolves of course don’t have to sell us Sako, as if a Premiership club came in for one of our boys (like with Guedioura) we’d cry foul of any low bids. Sako has a contract with Wolves. And if the boot was on other foot then we’d be demanding the club don’t sell. How it’d signal a lack of ambition.

Also all week when he looked like he was off Wolves fans were laughing, saying Sako is over rated and not worth that much. Now they keeping him, we were miserly and cheap and should go away and leave the best player ever to walk the earth alone.

Now I made the point that we laugh at Wolves fans saying Sako is better off there? I remember some Forest fans (and some who have claimed that comment is stupid) saying exactly the same thing when Guedioura went to Palace. What’s the difference here at the end of the day?

The problem for me is that Wolves fans are saying the player isn’t for sale, yet Wolves were clearly in negotiations with us about the right place. If he isn’t for sale then none of this would have happened. Clearly he is for sale, but bizarrely for a price that’s going up. In August he was available for around £3mill. Now it appears to be £5mill AND Jamie Paterson on loan (ha ha fucking ha) The West Midlands clearly is a hot bed for hilarity if that’s Sako’s worth. It isn’t. Not even slightly. Wolf’s board clearly thought we’d offer them the stupid money and they could run to the bank.

Sako isn’t worth that much. There are other players available for less money. The problem is will Wolves regret not taking this larger offer when they had the chance. It’s happened to us a few times, and you end meekly selling for cheaper later on.

Welcome Jamie Paterson

I’ll open this piece by admitting I next to nothing about this guy, most on Twitter seem to think they are already experts on him, which they have Youtube to thank for. What I have read and what people who seem to know what they are on about have said though excites me. He exactly the sort of player we need.

New Signing Paterson playing for Walsall

A young up and coming hungry player, and a winger to boot. This is exactly what we need, and continue to need and I’ll write more on this later. But he seems to be an exciting talent.

What is most promising is we beat off a host of other clubs supposedly to land his signature. Middlesbrough were also heavily linked amongst a number of Championship clubs. This means not only are an appealing prospect, but also that we are able to compete financially with supposedly big hitters.

Furthermore maybe it signifies a change in focus on where we recruit from, previously looking at Premiership reserves, to looking at players on the rise with a lot to prove. Even if that means there is a raft of fans who complain they never heard of him and aren’t happy because they seem to think we should only sign big named players

The fee is undisclosed. It was believed to be somewhere in the £500k to £1mill bracket depending on who you believe and what’s paid up front and what exists in add ons.