Head coach Nuno Espirito Santo insists Nottingham Forest can take pride from causing Manchester City problems despite suffering a 3-0 defeat at the Etihad Stadium.
Sloppy play at the back and missed chances proved costly for the Reds in their midweek clash. They gave their opponents too much time and space, and they were unable to make the most of promising moments at the other end of the pitch.
Jeremy Doku killed the game off after the break, following goals from Bernardo Silva and Kevin De Bruyne in the first half. But Nuno believes Forest can take encouragement from the way they gave it a go against the reigning Premier League champions.
“When you lose 3-0 and you say it was a good performance, maybe people don’t understand. So I won’t say it was a bad performance because there are positive things for us in the game,” said the Portuguese.
“Of course there were a lot of bad things and mistakes. But the idea of us facing City, knowing the difficulties we were going to face, we challenged ourselves to try to press and go for the game.
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“We had chances. We didn’t achieve and we lost. But us internally, I think we come out proud of ourselves because we tried. For sure, this game will allow us to grow.”
A key turning point in the game came when it was still 1-0 to City. Reds striker Chris Wood found himself clean through before the half-hour mark but put his effort narrowly wide. Almost immediately afterwards, the hosts doubled their lead and left the visitors facing an uphill battle.
“That minute was very important. It doesn’t reflect the whole game by itself but that minute was very important, for sure,” Nuno added.
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