Blackburn 0 Forest 1
Chris Hughton began his Nottingham Forest career with a win against in-form Blackburn Rovers. Both teams will look very different in the coming weeks; less than ideal preparations on both sides led to a drab, scrappy encounter from which Forest barely scraped a welcome victory. Hughton named a familiar looking side in a 4-2-3-1 system using a soft press, setting up to sit back and get the basics right with the emphasis on defence. Ryan Yates earned a deserved recall. Tony Mowbray deployed Blackburn in his 4-3-3 system, complaining that the team was ‘thrown together’; they were without three or four of this season’s top performers as well as any of their recent loan additions. With Bradly Dack still recovering from a cruciate ligament injury, on paper this was as poor a Rovers side as any team will face this season. The match was dictated by the two team’s different pressing games. As Forest concentrated on defence, they were very conservative in this regard, ceding possession and o