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SEASON 26/27 MATCH REPORTS
SEASON 2026/27 game 1 August 22th 2026
 Nottingham Forest 0 Leed 1Stach 88
HERE WE GO AGAIN
We've been trying to work out what people mean when they talk about Glasner's system. It's taken a while, but we think we've uncovered his secret plan.
First, pick the wrong starting eleven. Despite all evidence to the contrary, rely on McAtee and Ndoye to pretend they are more effective than flies hitting a windscreen. Instruct the players to spend most of the first half drifting in and out of a coma, passing sloppily, hoofing pointlessly, losing duels, trying to get sent off, failing to carry any weight up front, failing to press properly, failing to appreciate the predictable dynamics of moving objects, and generally looking uncomfortable in their own skin. The plan to start improving towards the end of the first half comes with the condition that all efforts to cross or shoot should be appalling or at best hit the woodwork.
The half time bollocking should be delivered in an infrequently used German dialect so that the players have no idea what they are doing but at least put in a lot more effort doing it. Accordingly the second half is approached with greater determination and the more consistent application of basic skills, even if this leads to a dangerously open game at times. Increased pressure on the opposition should not, however, result in better finishing.
The third part of the cunning plan involves the belated introduction of Schlager and Netz, and these additions, with Williams moving to the right, produce a more balanced and effective unit, so effective that the Forest rearguard will go to sleep and concede a ridiculously simple goal.
Such was the plan, and it worked perfectly. The plan was simple, but the reasons for it were more complicated. Some have suggested that the less than satisfactory display was Glasner's way of appealing for some much needed signings, especially up front. Some have suggested that Glasner is simply unimaginative and slow to learn. Some have suggested that his face is made of plasticene, but that's just silly.
Whatever, there seemed little discernible difference between Glasner's Forest and the Forest of last season. But these are early days. We feel sure that Glasner's system will become clearer and more productive as the season wears on.
And on.
NO EXCUSES
At some point, my brain stopped working. It had to, because it couldn't cope with stuff it neither expected nor understood.
Things didn't start well. My brain didn't understand how Glasner could pick a midfield of McAtee and Schlager. It was like building a wall out of meringue, wasn't it? And Ndoye, for God's sake. My brain didn't understand, but at least it knew what to expect. Annihilation. It prepared itself for Annihilation, and whistled "I told you so" to the tune of Handel's Dead March.
When the game started, Annihilation didn't arrive. In fact, expected reality began to shift into a dimension which made no sense at all, which was worrying. McAtee, that moth's wing of a footballer, was spraying the ball around like a card sharp dealing off the bottom. The midfield wasn't getting overrun. Forest were making Liverpool look like a squadron of poorly maintained diggers. And there was the hopeless DanDoye finishing a neat move in splendid fashion to put Forest ahead.
None of this was supposed to happen, not after the miserable display against Leed, and the miserable display against Leed. The only way my brain could process this was by telling me that this was a conspiracy to prove how stupid I was. Or it wasn't really happening at all.
My brain settled on the "not really happening" option. It was the only way to explain things like
Aina making the wing-back thing work, Jesus giving the Poo defence the heebie-jeebies, the VAR cancelling a Poo goal, the whine of the Poo supporters like the wind in the telephone lines, some ginger bloke running around the pitch unconvincingly, MacAllister being so laughably Argentinian, Neco Williams making himself undroppable and, hopefully, unsellable. Of all the things which didn't happen, the most thrilling was the realisation that Forest were far, far better than their hosts.
It couldn't last, of course. Reality kicked back in, and the brain switched channels. There was McAtee folding like a wet cardboard box, allowing a cross to be made for Etiquette to score, proving that I was right after all about everything, and being comfortably certain that the Poo would go on to win the game.
Then the useless Delap took a smart throw in to Williams whose charge into the box was halted by Allison's trip and MGW scored the penalty. That, I think, was the point at which my brain admitted that everything I'd said about the system, the players, the manager, was bollocks. The brain just gave up. I didn't care about the rest of the match. The strange ginger rug scored an equaliser which Sels might have reached if it hadn't clipped Murillo's toe, but it didn't matter. All that mattered was that Forest were the better side, and I, along with many others, had been proved to be a little bit stupid.
You may start to hear trains thundering in the distance, but that's because your brain isn't working properly.
BEAN TIME
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